Arrrgh - train tickets

[Arch]

I know, if you want a bargain, you need to do a little legwork, but really....

I want a ticket to my sister's in April (hoorah, a visit to see Oli!). As cheap as I can, but I would (and have in the past) pay the premium for the direct train I normally get. Which suddenly doesn't exist according to either the trainline, or Crosscountry. In fact there were trains on trainline, which should be Crosscountry, but aren't on their website.

Anyway, assuming I HAVE to change at Brum, which it looks like I do now (ugh - hell hole!), I juggle about and find I can book two singles, and save nearly £20 on the return ticket, hoorah! Even better if I go through travelsupermarket, they have £5 off any ticket over 20 (one of my one ways is). So I do that, but for some reason it's only doing the outward ticket, and I can't get it to do the return on the same booking. I'd book that separately, but there's a £2,50 charge for the using a credit card, which I'd rather do, because I've just paid the leccy bill so this month is a bit tight. Two separate bookings defeats all the discount, and frankly, has sapped my will to live.

So I'll do what I always do in the end, since I'll be at the station tomorrow, and go and stand in a queue at the travel centre and see if the nice lady can sort it all out for the cost of the two advance singles, which she normally can.

Sorry, I just needed a little rant.

<and breathe>

 

[rich p]

Very annoying. Mrs rich p spends ages trying to find the best price on ticketd just to save the NHS some money!
She found it cheaper recently to book a journey to Liverpool in 2 bits. One ticket to St Albans and then another on to Liverpool. Crazy.

 

[domd1979]

Booking train tickets at a reasonable price is certainly a challenging business...

Sometimes re-booking at a station (or two, or three) en-route and having several tickets is cheaper than one. Admittedly that needs the time to play with national rail website to look up the different fares.

Last week I had a trip to London for work. No advance tickets, and had to be there for 9, so it had to be a full fare ticket - £164 return. Kerching!! No ticket checks in both directions, and no ticket barriers at Euston - very annoying.

 

[Arch]

Very annoying. Mrs rich p spends ages trying to find the best price on ticketd just to save the NHS some money!
She found it cheaper recently to book a journey to Liverpool in 2 bits. One ticket to St Albans and then another on to Liverpool. Crazy.

yeah, they mentioned that on moneysavingexpert.com - I tried it, but it didn't work out cheaper. But apparently it can be a massive saving.

I do like to go to the station and enquire - I always have a slight fear that I'll do something wrong on a website, and in person you can double check stuff.

I wouldn't be all that surprised to find that the direct train does still exist but isn't on the web - that's happened before. On the other hand if I can save £20, that's a lot...

 

[sheddy]

and while you're at the station, its sometimes interesting to bung in your destination just to get a default price on the touch screen ticket machine.

 

[vernon]

Very annoying. Mrs rich p spends ages trying to find the best price on ticketd just to save the NHS some money!
She found it cheaper recently to book a journey to Liverpool in 2 bits. One ticket to St Albans and then another on to Liverpool. Crazy.

it doesn't surprise me one bit.

The weekend before last I saved about four quid on what would have been a £12.50 or thereabouts fare from Darlington to Leeds by splitting the journey at Northallerton.

I discovered it by chance through a complicated sequence of events that are excuciatingly boring in the retelling.

 

[Kirstie]

The trains websites are a bit odd, because the trains and tickets you get offered change according to your IP address and also how many searches you've done on a particular journey. Their data mining algorithms can determine from your past and current search habits what you're likely to buy, and alter the search results accordingly.

I know this from the faff that I have buying tickets for cycle tours. Different people on the tour get offered different tickets, and different trains at the same time we are all searching for tickets.

Last week I did a search for tickets to Brum from Berwick. Within a five minute period I'd been offered first, a ticket at £32, then, I ran the search again and the £32 ticket disappeared to a £42, and the third time the train I wanted the ticket for had disappeared completely. The great train robbery, on so many levels!

 

[Rhythm Thief]

Does anyone else remember the days when it was simply a matter of turning up at the station twenty minutes before your train left, and buying a ticket? No need to book eight years in advance in order to save a thousand pounds on the cost of your travel. Life was much simpler then.

 

[Noodley]

Just jump on the train and when they ask for "tickets from ...." sit perfectly still. If they ask for "all tickets" fumble about in a confident manner, then look perplexed, then have a moment of enlightenment as you remember it's in your jacket which is in the overhead rack....then panic when you realise someone has stolen your purse with the ticket all your money and cards in it. Then cry.

 

[rich p]

The trains websites are a bit odd, because the trains and tickets you get offered change according to your IP address and also how many searches you've done on a particular journey. Their data mining algorithms can determine from your past and current search habits what you're likely to buy, and alter the search results accordingly.

I know this from the faff that I have buying tickets for cycle tours. Different people on the tour get offered different tickets, and different trains at the same time we are all searching for tickets.

Last week I did a search for tickets to Brum from Berwick. Within a five minute period I'd been offered first, a ticket at £32, then, I ran the search again and the £32 ticket disappeared to a £42, and the third time the train I wanted the ticket for had disappeared completely. The great train robbery, on so many levels!

I wonder if that's why my quote for an Easyjet flight went up £10 when I went back to it the the next day?