Great Western Coffee Shop

Travelled from Weymouth to Bristol today on the 0850 departure, and was just wondering the validity of off-peak tickets on this line. I was charged ^15.65 (with a young person's railcard), for an 'Anytime Day Return'. I've always throught that the Off-Peak equiviliant (^9.60) was valid from 0659 on this particular route.

Can anyone shed any light on this?

Luke

Trains after 0700 are valid for Off Peak fares.

Travelling before 10am there is a minimum fare with Young persons card, (^12.00), as I constantly keep reminding people at the moment.....

Thanks, jester: I was trying to puzzle that one out ...  ::) ;)

With the minimum fare taken into account, would the fare not be ^12?

Should have been...

Hmm - interesting. I didn't mind paying the extra, still good value IMO. There just seem to be quite a few different prices for the same train.

You could always try claiming back the extra from whichever company's ticket office it was sold you the ticket - it'll be printed with the date and time of issue so you shouldn't have many difficulties making your case and getting them to agree.

Did you buy from the ticket office or a TVM at Weymouth? If the latter, they may have set the offpeak start time wrongly in the TVM, and the ticket office ought to sort you out AND get the TVM problem fixed.

Paul

I purchased my ticket from the conductor on board the train.

I am pretty certain that the TVM offers the correct fare - but as I had two minutes before the train left, and knowing that I could buy my ticket on board, I couldn't check this.

Luke

Explains why, at stations with a ticket office or TVM then the conductor is meant to sell you the Anytime fare to encourage you to buy at the station and therefore not evade paying a fair.

...although in that situation you wouldn't normally be given the benefit of a railcard discount.

You appear to have been lucky. The conductor could've charged you the full undiscounted Anytime Day Return Fare ^23.70. When ticket purchasing facilities are available it is the passengers responsibility to ensure they have sufficient time to purchase their ticket before boarding a train. If you'd been travelling with SWT from Weymouth you could have been Penalty Fare'd as well.

Having said all that, it's nice to see a bit of discretion on the part of the conductor, for someone who was running late. 

Ah fair enough - I knew about the penalty fare scheme, but was unaware of the the requirement to purchase the ticket at the station, to include railcard discount.

As you say, it was nice of the conductor to exercise his discretion on this one.

Many thanks for all the replies,

Luke

does this also include the devon day ranger which is available from 9am during the week as i have purchased one from a manned ticket office between 9 and 10 which with a ypr comes to 6.60

??? >:(

i belive he missed the word 'some'

Doesn't seem to be any exclusion for rangers. Wasn't during July and August, or a public holiday by any chance was it, when the min fare is lifted?

Paul

nope was a wednesday as i recall

Why isn't there just one affordable fare, for example, one fare between Exeter and Bristol, Exeter and London Padd. Etc.?

Hmm.  ::)

I am in full agreement with you on that one, DevonTrains2008.  ;)

However, I also suspect that about 90% of the previous posts here in "Fare's Fair" will give you 'reasons' why we seem to have built up such an horrendously complicated fare structure.

I really would like to see all of these often archaic restrictions swept away, and a completely new system introduced, rather than us having to put up with even more 'tinkering' with the existing structure.

But, realistically: it just isn't going to happen.  Is it?  :(

No - because if it did - the unions would find a reason to complain and go on strike

I think the Unions broadly support a new simpler nationwide system of fares as it could be described as a small step towards re-nationalisation of the railways, one of their main aims.

Don't the  bulk of passengers support renationalisation given that the privatised system appears to cost more in subsidies and deliver less punctual trains than the nationalised one?

The worst example of petty red tape is that Arriva Trains Wales and FGW can't be bothered to hold connecting trains for 30 seconds at stations like Newport where their networks intersect. As a result it is common for passengers to be delayed for 30 mins. or an hour just because a train was 5 minutes or so late.

Whenever I travel on continental railways, such as Switzerland, the fare structure seems to be very simple; e.g., you're never asked when you intend to return to Zurich. I suggest that ours has deliberately been made complicated in order to raise more revenue. Wasn't there an announcement last year about a supposed simplification to advance purchase, off peak returns and peak returns? That was followed this year by ... FGW renaming the off-peak the super off-peak and increasing the price of an off-peak by 15-20%.

D.

Would you like to quote the numbers that show that the privatized railway system is supposedly less punctual than British rail? Last time I checked the current system was delivering the best punctuality in living memory and was still on an upward trajectory.


It was also followed by FGW effectively halving the cost of long-distance single fares (which in the past had been the return fare less GBP1.00; now they're half the price) giving passengers the flexibility to book peak/off-peak/super-off-peak/advance singles as appropriate for each leg of their journey, so now if you travel one way in the peak and one way in the off-peak you can make a considerable saving. It's worth noting that Barry Doe (who is hardly FGW's biggest fan and has been very critical of them in the past) in a recent issue of RAIL has heaped fulsome praise on FGW for these changes and suggested that a similar model should be applied across the country.

And please, let's not perpetuate the myth that rail travel in continental Europe is some sort of public transport nirvana. The Swiss system is certainly impressive, but everything except the profitable intercity division is subsidized to the hilt. Meanwhile in France, for example, whilst the TGV is superb, once you're off the main intercity routes services can be appalling.

It doesn't work both ways - you can't criticize the British railway system for being subsidized then wax lyrical about the continental systems which are heavily subsidized by their respective governments!

I have to say this appears to be a bit of a "rose coloured" view of the "good old days". I remember all too well the steam hauled days - dirty, unpunctual. Then we had the great leap forward into dieselisation - not quite as dirty, even more unpunctual !
I used to travel regularly (or try to !) between Exeter and Salisbury on the "new, modern" diesel service, on the newly singled track - what a disaster !

Certainly, some of the "connections" between different TOCs could be better, but there are plenty like this within individual TOCs - just as there were in the days of BR.

As much as we complain about the railways today, they WERE much worse in the past. Refund for a late running train ? unheard of ! (NOT because the trains ran on time !) Taxi, if you miss a connection - no chance !