why do you buy online?

[whole diary]

[6 OF 2 redundant adjunct of unimatrix 01]

I would be interested to hear honest answers on this one to the following yes or no answers to see why people book online

1> the adverts for the websites lead me to believe that online is cheaper than the station
2>even with a booking fee i am still saving money
3>i use the web to purchase my tickets as the nearest staffed station is too far away
4>the websites sell the full range of tickets
5>if you have a problem collecting your tickets/find out you have purchased the wrong ones you can get them refunded or amended at the station
6>the website will automatically offer you cheaper ways of doing things like offering you a railcard (if on a suitable journey and if eligible) if the ticket costs more than 84 pounds or groupsave


to be honest apart from special offers i see now and again like evouchers and using clubcard vouchers and one of the above im not sure why people use them....

especially after finding a booking confirmation for 4x anytime day returns to london today for travel today all priced with no discount what so ever on a saturday !! with a 1 pound booking fee and a 3.50 credit card fee so totaling 375.90 instead of the walk up fair on a groupsave as its a saturday super off peak all day costing  89.20 ...... for all four !

[JayMac]

1. No, I'm not mislead. (Although less savyy folk may well be). That said there are often online only walk-up tickets that are cheaper than buying the equivalent (or near equivalent) at the station. Virgin's SVH for example, or TOC^▸ (Train Operating Company) special offers such as those often run by London Midland.

2. With an exact like for like walk up ticket (excl. examples mentioned above) you'll never save money versus buying at the station.

3. This one does sometimes apply to me when I prefer to get the bus to a staffed station rather than walk to my nearest unstaffed one. In this case I'll often buy online. Currently I'm using redspottedhanky.com for such purchases. I can build up loyalty points or use Tesco Clubcard vouchers when I have enough.

4. If only! Websites are useless for Rovers & Rangers.

5. That rather depends on the original ticket type purchased.

6. Websites don't automatically offer the you the cheapest way of purchasing tickets suitable for your needs. The correct criteria need to be inputted by the user.

In all honesty it's swings and roundabouts. For me, sometimes online is better, sometimes it's more convenient for me to buy onboard, from a TVM^▸ (Ticket Vending Machine) or a staffed station.

As to your final point, if I'd met the person who'd bought the 4x SDRs, I'd be advising them not to use the original tickets, put them in for a refund (less admin fees) and then advising them to buy the GroupSave. 

[6 OF 2 redundant adjunct of unimatrix 01]

unfortunately all i found was litter !

but i can tell you that this is quite common!

[inspector_blakey]

In my case it's because I live in the wrong bleedin' country so I'm usually trying to find cheapo Advance tickets to get back home from Heathrow. The annoying thing is, as far as I've ever been able to establish, there's no means of collecting tickets at Terminal 5 (unless someone knows better...!)

Not so much of a problem if you're taking the RailAir bus though as these add-ons are actually cheaper if purchased as an 'e-ticket' direct from the RailAir website then I can pick up my tickets at RDG^‡(resolve).

[Brucey]

I tend to buy online for one of the following reasons:
1. Buy advance tickets without having to travel 7 miles to the nearest station.
2. To make sure I buy the correct walk-up tickets I want (which is especially useful when splitting journeys).
3. Cashback is currently available on train tickets purchased online!

It annoys me when people think they've saved money having bought a SVR online, paid a postage fee and paid a booking fee, without a seat reservation as the service is unreservable.

[laird]

I buy online because I can research the fare and identify the lowest possible fare, getting a ticket office to do that would be impractical.
Once I find the fare I will not pay booking fees, credit card fees, ticket collection fees but will with some websites be able to choose a favourite seat.
If anyone ever asks you to pay a fee for buying a ticket and they aren't offering some sort of compensation walk away.
When I research if the fare is cheaper at the station then I'll buy there, usually that is applicable to Groupsave (potentially appearing online), Ranger and Rover fares.
With those very few exceptions I'll always save online by going via one of the cashback providing websites where they share the sales commission with me.

[6 OF 2 redundant adjunct of unimatrix 01]

Dont get me wrong there are some occasions for which online booking is damn handy! If you live too far away for example , as you lovely smart people have shopped around and know what your doing you don't get ripped off, at a station short of splitting tickets you have to be offered the cheapest fair... Online its down to you to assess all the information and decide yourself

[Hafren]

 - If I need to buy several tickets (multiple journeys or splits) I'll probably do the research online anyway, so might as well buy then, rather than explain it all at the booking office or go down to find that the advances are no longer available.
 - Website offers - cashback (topcashback etc) or reduced advance fares (e.g. when using Southern recently).
 - If it's an expensive journey I might prefer to pay when I have the money, even if I'm paying no less than I would on the day.

Sometimes the booking office is better, even for longer journeys, e.g. if I have vouchers. I'm not usually going to book a local journey in advance - perhaps the night before from the machine if I don't want to queue on the day. And obviously for certain fares (weekly seasons etc) the booking office is better. The death of dedicated advance booking areas tilts things in favour of websites.

The advertising for certain websites is downright misleading. Unless it's a TOC^▸ (Train Operating Company)-specific offer it's unlikely to be cheaper. It perhaps doesn't help that a ticket can be bought in advance but not an 'Advance' ticket; perhaps one of the old names like 'Apex^▸ (Advanced Purchase Excursion (fare))' or 'Value' would help to differntiate it, but I suspect a lot of people just don't look at the actual name.

[JayMac]

at a station short of splitting tickets you have to be offered the cheapest fair...

There have been a few occasions where I've asked for the cheapest day return to London at Bristol Temple Meads. Every time, I've initially been offered a fare to Paddington. It's only my prompting that has led to fares to Waterloo being offered.

A survey by Which? earlier this year showed that in more than 50% of cases, when using stations or a human at National Rail Enquiries, the cheapest fare for the journey(s) was not offered.

[6 OF 2 redundant adjunct of unimatrix 01]

Well that should not happen you should be asked if its via reading or Salisbury

[grahame]

Well that should not happen you should be asked if its via reading or Salisbury

"I don't bleeding care - I just want to go to London"  Of course the staff really can't win, can they?

But I do also agree with BigNoseMac that the cheapest fare isn't always offered, and that's often because the cheapest fare to get you from "B" to "D" isn't necessarily a "B" to "D" / any route ticket. 

[JayMac]

Indeed. The cheapest way to get to London from Bristol TM^‡(resolve) is with a ticket that isn't from Bristol TM!

[grahame]

Indeed. The cheapest way to get to London from Bristol TM^‡(resolve) is with a ticket that isn't from Bristol TM!

Even looking at Bristol fares, I get confused though.

Returns to Paddington cost 169.00, 61.00 or 48.80 for peak, off peak and super offpeak. Singles cost 84.50, 37.00 and 28.00 which mean if you're doing a return that's peak one way and one of the off peaks the other you may pay 121.50 or 112.50. Via Salisbury, there appears to be a superoffpeak day return at 35.00, an anytime day single for 34.10, and various other fares, with single fares differing eastbound and westbound.

And I haven't looked at Advance, First Class, splitting or longer journey tickets, nor Megatrain (is that still around?)

Ah - I'm researching that online.  Perhaps I should go down to my local station and ask there 

[Brucey]

Perhaps I should go down to my local station and ask there 

They'll probably be as equally confused as the customer if you want anything other than a bog standard ticket.  There are currently 73 fares available for the stations Bristol Temple Meads to London Terminals ranging in price from ^10.50 (WES rte AP SLOUGH) to ^279.00 (FOR rte Any Permitted) ... excluding Megatrain, seasons, rovers, carnets, split fares and over-distance tickets.

[Surrey 455]

In my case, I buy online because I'll often want to get to a destination where part of the journey is already covered by my existing season ticket. If I just turn up at my local station the ticket office has short hours and will probably be closed by 11am. The ticket machine will only sell me a ticket starting from that station. On the web I can see which station is just inside London zone 6 and select a ticket from there collecting it at my local stations ticket machine.
The downside is that I have to allow 2 hours before I collect it, so impulse journeys cannot be done this way. When this happens I have to use my existing season ticket to go to the ticket office at whichever station I have to change trains at. Also I noticed that the last time I used Southerns website, it would not allow me to collect my ticket at a station managed by another operator