Restrictions on a High Wycombe to Kyle journey with BOJ at Birmingham

I quite fancy another trip to Syke just to break the tedium between Christmas and Easter and checked for fares between High Wycombe (HWY) and Kyle of Lochalsh (KYL) with preferred route being via BHM and Preston. Trainline.com comes up with the following :

Super Of Peak Return £165.10

dep HWY 0610 arr KYL 20.26 ( 5 changes)

Breakdown of journey as follows :

dep HWY 0610 arr Birmingham Snow Hill (BSW) 0810
dep BHM 0920 arr Carlisle (CAR) 1200 ( Virgin Trains)
dep CAR 1211 arr Edinburgh Haymarket (HYM) 1333
dep HYM 1340 arr Inverness (INV) 1704
dep INV 1754 arr KYL 2026

As the ticket is a Super Off Peak and I'm catching the 0920 Virgin service from BHM am I correct in assuming that one can use an off peak or super off peak ticket on a Virgin train from BHM after 0905 ( the XC off peak starts at 0930) ? I embarked on a similar journey last year and caught the 0820 from BHM to CAR on an Off Peak ( not London) return ticket. If the Super Off Peak is valid before 0900 on Virgin from BHM this would be an even cheaper option and I may again be able to catch the 0820. Just need clarification on the time restrictions of the Super Off Peak and Off Peak (not London) tickets out of Birmingham New Street on Virgin. In an ideal world I would like to catch the 0820 BHM to Lancaster / Preston / CAR (Virgin) , then use TPE to Glasgow Central and continuing from Queen St to Inverness via Perth.

High Wycombe to Kyle of Lochalsh Super Off-Peak Return has restriction 9F.

Code 9F
Code used to stations in Scotland and Berwick upon Tweed

SUPER OFF-PEAK JOURNEYS FROM/VIA LONDON (including Stevenage, Watford Junction, Milton Keynes, Bedford & Luton).

Available as listed below MONDAYS-FRIDAYS (By any train on Bank Holidays and other days)

For journeys from southern England via Birmingham on CrossCountry, use restriction code 2V or 8X as appropriate.
For journeys from Anglia via Ely, use restriction code 3V

Outward travel NORTHBOUND – by any train scheduled to DEPART: London Terminals (except as shown below)
Before 03:00, between 09:06 and
14:57 inclusive & at or after 18:59.
Also allowed at or after 18:15 on
Fridays.

Return travel SOUTHBOUND – by any train scheduled to ARRIVE: London Terminals (except as shown below)
Before 04:30 & at or after 11:17

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(none of the "except as shown below" options mentions Marylebone). This would seem to bar any Chiltern train that departs London between 03:00 and 09:06. The bit about "For journeys from southern England via Birmingham on CrossCountry, use restriction code 2V or 8X as appropriate" is interesting, as your journey is via Birmingham but isn't on CrossCountry. If the booking engines are prepared to offer you this itinerary then it suggests they're interpreting the journey as one on which 8X (05:00 or later) applies, rather than 2V (09:30 or later) or the 9F restriction above.

Your title is a little misleading - the restrictions which apply are attached to your ticket, not applied in a blanket fashion by any particular operator.

For the £165.10 Super Off Peak Return, restriction code 9F applies if travelling via London (permitted on this ticket), and either 2V or 8X if not travelling via London. I'd be interested to hear of how to determine which is supposed to be the "appropriate" code, but I'd expect it to be 2V8X, which is a simple "any train except those scheduled to depart before 0500". edit: see below

LexyBoy said:

I'd expect it to be 2V, which is a simple "any train except those scheduled to depart before 0500".

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2V is 09:30, it's 8X that is 05:00. Birmingham to Kyle Off-Peak Return appears to have restriction 2V (found by searching for a weekend trip on the NR journey planner, it won't offer anything but the Anytime on a weekday) so you're probably right.

To the OP, the usual advice in this situation is that if a booking engine will let you book this ticket for this itinerary then do so and get seat reservations and take a printout of the booking confirmation with you when you travel, which will make it much harder for anyone to challenge you en route. If they think the ticket has been issued in error it's not your fault, they need to approach the ticket seller to fix their routing engine.

East Coast offer the itinerary - leaving at 0648, changing to XC at Banbury and to Virgin at Wolverhampton then to Carlisle, Haymarket, etc. Will save the trainline's fee if nothing else

The times at Brum, etc, are not relevant unless the restriction code adds them

button_boxer said:

2V is 09:30, it's 8X that is 05:00. Birmingham to Kyle Off-Peak Return appears to have restriction 2V (found by searching for a weekend trip on the NR journey planner, it won't offer anything but the Anytime on a weekday) so you're probably right.

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Yes, you're right - it seems that even for such a long journey there are such ridiculous restrictions that the Off Peak tickets are not actually usable! Looking at Oxford>Kyle via XC, NRE only offers Off Peak tickets on the 1007 and later but still gives 9F as the restriction.

I'd agree with your advice on getting a printed itinerary, though it's not likely there will be a problem I'd have thought.

The trainline itinerary suggests the 0920 out of BHM which to me implies an 8X restriction code which would then allow me to catch the earlier 0820 train. As I said in my original post I did this journey last year and bought an Off Peak Return ( not London) which allowed me to catch the 0820 out of BHM. What did occur to me was that there have been changes imposed by XC on tickets and their restrictions and this may have altered the time validity of a HWY-KYL off peak ( not london) / super off peak return ( not london route).

dzug2 said:

East Coast offer the itinerary - leaving at 0648, changing to XC at Banbury and to Virgin at Wolverhampton then to Carlisle, Haymarket, etc. Will save the trainline's fee if nothing else

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The cheapest return ticket that EC offers me for that itinerary on a weekday is £327.

button_boxer said:

The cheapest return ticket that EC offers me for that itinerary on a weekday is £327.

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Ditto bb. I don't want to pay double the fare that I could / should be paying.

I'm sure there was a thread on here recently suggesting that XC were changing many of their 8X SVRs to 2V.

dzug2 said:

The times at Brum, etc, are not relevant unless the restriction code adds them

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They are if the train originates from a station mentioned in the restriction code though, e.g. a London-Glasgow train joined at Birmingham or Preston.

General Zod said:

The trainline itinerary suggests the 0920 out of BHM which to me implies an 8X restriction code which would then allow me to catch the earlier 0820 train.

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When you have figured out the restriction, don't book on thetrainline!

button_boxer said:

The cheapest return ticket that EC offers me for that itinerary on a weekday is £327.

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It offered me the £160 odd one - this was clicking through from National Rail, which wouldn't show it, only overnight journeys.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

LexyBoy said:

They are if the train originates from a station mentioned in the restriction code though, e.g. a London-Glasgow train joined at Birmingham or Preston.

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Why? The restriction code 9F is titled journeys starting in or via London - and a few specifically mentioned places like Milton Keynes. No mention of Birmingham or Preston. The 2V/8X are specifically in terms of starting time from the station of origin with no further restrictions defined.

dzug2 said:

Why? The restriction code 9F is titled journeys starting in or via London - and a few specifically mentioned places like Milton Keynes.

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You're right, I'll get me coat... Still not used to being awake so early it would seem!

I am considering travelling to Glasgow from Cheltenham later this year and when I looked it appeared as though I could use an off peak ticket on the 7.12 from Cheltenham either going straight through to Glasgow (via Edinburgh) or changing at New Street onto a Virgin train.

button_boxer said:

The cheapest return ticket that EC offers me for that itinerary on a weekday is £327.

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Curiouser and curiouser. I can get the £165.10 Super Off-Peak Return for your original itinerary on eastcoast.co.uk by specifying "via Birmingham Snow Hill". Bizarrely it doesn't come up if I say "via Birmingham Moor Street" even though the 06:10 from HWY stops at Moor Street before Snow Hill (and Moor Street to New Street is a shorter walk than Snow Hill to New Street).

My guess is that the booking engine is treating the super off-peak as unrestricted on this itinerary as 9F only applies restrictions to journeys via London (in its own restriction text) or "via Birmingham on CrossCountry" (via the 2V/8X cross-reference), or "from Anglia via Ely", none of which apply in this case.

I'm glad I'm not the only one having fun with this little puzzle.
I tried purchase a BHM-INV off peak return via CAR on the Virgin website so as to secure a Virgin train/route but again the only trains on which I could buy this ticket were after 0930. From this I deduce that Virgin also have the 0930 restriction out of BHM ?

General Zod said:

I tried purchase a BHM-INV off peak return via CAR on the Virgin website so as to secure a Virgin train/route but again the only trains on which I could buy this ticket were after 0930. From this I deduce that Virgin also have the 0930 restriction out of BHM ?

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In this case it would be that the BHM-INV SVR takes a 2V restriction, which isn't affected by the route you take.

Virgin site : HWY-KYL (Via Banbury + EDB)

Allowed to use the 0920 from BHM on a Super Off Peak.


This involves dep 0610 HWY arr BMO 0801 , dep BHM 0920.

Perhaps the connection does not fit into the websites criteria but would I be allowed to travel on the 0820 from BHM with the Super Off Peak ticket ? I've made the dash from BMO to BHM in less than 10 minutes. I would like to catch the 0820 as it leaves plenty of connection time at Edinburgh or Glasgow whereas the 0920 only allows 7 minutes at Haymarket - very dicey indeed !

The potential problem now is that is impossible to complete the weekday journey ( to KYL) in one day unless you are willing to pay approx fare of £300. If you are financially restricted to buying Off Peak or Super Off Peak tickets then you have no choice but BOJ overnight , stay in a hotel and then resume your journey the next morning.

General Zod said:

Perhaps the connection does not fit into the websites criteria but would I be allowed to travel on the 0820 from BHM with the Super Off Peak ticket ? I've made the dash from BMO to BHM in less than 10 minutes.

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I don't see why not.

General Zod said:

I'm glad I'm not the only one having fun with this little puzzle.
I tried purchase a BHM-INV off peak return via CAR on the Virgin website so as to secure a Virgin train/route but again the only trains on which I could buy this ticket were after 0930. From this I deduce that Virgin also have the 0930 restriction out of BHM ?

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There's no such thing as a blanket peak or off-peak train, much as operators might like it to be so. Each off-peak and super off-peak ticket between each pair of origin and destination has its own set of restrictions, and for any given train there will be some off-peak tickets that are valid and some that aren't. BHM-INV off-peak return has restriction 2V, which is one of the simpler ones - not valid for travel before 09:30 regardless of which operator and which station you're trying to use it at. HWY-INV super off-peak return takes the 9F restriction we've been discussing earlier in the thread, which appears to allow the 09:20 from New Street to Carlisle.
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General Zod said:

Perhaps the connection does not fit into the websites criteria but would I be allowed to travel on the 0820 from BHM with the Super Off Peak ticket ?

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If the ticket is truly unrestricted if you avoid London and avoid XC then yes, you should be able to. I'm speculating here but I suspect the reason it doesn't give you any itinerary changing at Moor Street is that the official connection time from Moor Street would miss the 08:20, and if the fastest option it can find in that case involves XC (e.g. to Manchester and the TPE from there) then 2V kicks in and it thinks the super off-peak is not valid because you started from HWY before 09:30.

Cheers guys. What I will do is to buy a HWY-KYL Super Off Peak Return and use it on the 0820 from BHM. It means departing HWY at 0610 and making a dash to BHM from BMO. Catching this train allows me an hour to loaf between Glasgow Central and Queens St from where I intend to go to KYL via Perth and Inverness.

Just as an aside from the Virgin website :

BHM - KYL

dep BHM 0820 arr KYL 20.26 ( via Glasgow / EDB )

Only ticket available for sale is £324.00 Anytime Return

Seems ridiculous that a passenger starting his / her journey at BHM is paying so much more, for the same train and shorter journey, than a person who started their journey 1 hr 50 mins ( 100 miles) earlier.

General Zod said:

Seems ridiculous that a passenger starting his / her journey at BHM is paying so much more, for the same train and shorter journey, than a person who started their journey 1 hr 50 mins ( 100 miles) earlier.

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Not really - here is an example. Sheffield to Birmingham on 06.50 XC would cost around £75. Using same train but buying an Off Peak return to Shrewsbury would cost about £45. However you MAY NOT break your journey at Birmingham on the outward journey (I.e. NOT leave New Street, though you have to change trains). SHF-BHM is priced by XC,whilst SHF- Shrewsbury ( also valid via Stockport) is priced by TPE. BoJ is OK on return journey.

Though in this example restriction 9F wouldn't seem to preclude starting short at BHM...

I have been asked to clarify where to find the Validity Code for a £165.10 Super Off-Peak Return (SSR) High Wycombe - Kyle of Lochalsh route + Any Permitted. This fare is set by East Coast and has Validity code 9F.

Go to National Rail Enquiries. In Find my train times & fares, click on Add a return journey, then enter some dates and times of travel. I find it helpful to choose Saturday dates at this stage, so that a wide choice of ticket types becomes available.

So I ask for [stn]HWY[/stn] to [stn]KYL[/stn], outward at 0600 on 7 January and returning at 1000 on 14 January. Oddly, NRE offers only a 1223 departure taking 25h 22m, but this is sufficient for the purpose of identifying the Validity code. Towards the bottom of the page is a blue box which says that the price is £165.10 and gives the ticket type. Click on Super Off-Peak Return.

This takes you to the Ticket terms & conditions. Towards the bottom of this long page are two useful hyperlinks, view the specific 'Validity Code' applicable to the journey plan that you have selected and view the complete list of 'Validity Codes' applicable to the ticket type that you have selected. Choosing the former leads us to Validity code 9F.

If that is a little complicated, unfortunately the interpretation of the meaning of the code for this journey is no easier. We are told that Validity code 9F is the code used to stations in Scotland and Berwick upon Tweed for Super Off-Peak journeys from or via London, Stevenage, Watford Junction, Milton Keynes, Bedford or Luton.

It is but on this occasion the OP wants to use this ticket by a different, shorter, but still Permitted Route. General Zod's chosen itinerary is:

0610 High Wycombe - Birmingham Moor St 0801 (Chiltern)
0820 Birmingham New St - Haymarket 1214 (Virgin)
or, if missed, 0920 Birmingham New St - Carlisle 1200 (Virgin); 1211 Carlisle - Haymarket 1333 (TPE)
1340 Haymarket - Inverness 1704 (ScotRail)
1754 Inverness - Kyle of Lochalsh 2026 (ScotRail)

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To determine whether this itinerary is valid for the £165.10 Super Off-Peak Return, we need to examine Validity code 9F.

This starts by saying For journeys from southern England via Birmingham on CrossCountry, use restriction code 2V or 8X as appropriate. General Zod's itinerary does not use CrossCountry, so none of the restrictions in these two codes apply to this journey.

Next, we are told For journeys from Anglia via Ely, use restriction code 3V. The itinerary does not go via Ely, so the restrictions in this code do not apply to this journey.

Finally, there is a list of restrictions on outward travel on any train scheduled to depart at certain times from some London stations, Stevenage, Luton, Luton Airport Parkway, Bedford, Watford Junction or Milton Keynes. To see if any of these restrictions apply, we need to check the National Rail Timetable.

This shows that the trains we may use are:

0610 High Wycombe - Birmingham Snow Hill 0810 (Table 115)
0820 Birmingham New St - Edinburgh 1221 (Table 65)
0920 Birmingham New St - Glasgow Central 1317 (Table 65)
1000 Manchester Airport - Edinburgh 1339 (Table 65)
1335 Edinburgh - Inverness 1704 (Table 229)
1754 Inverness - Wick 2214 & Kyle of Lochalsh 2026 (Table 239)

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None of these trains depart at any time from any of the stations listed in Validity code 9F. Therefore none of the restrictions within 9F apply.

Therefore this is a valid travel itinerary for the outward leg of a £165.10 Super Off-Peak Return (SSR) High Wycombe - Kyle of Lochalsh route + Any Permitted.

John, it looks like two of us have done the same research (including the trick of how to find the validity code on NRE) and reached the same conclusion. This is reassuring

My initial concern was whether the High Wycombe to Birmingham 0610 was a train that started from London Terminals at a barred time but a second reading of the code made me think that only applies if travelling via London. Now I see that this is irrelevant as the 0610 starts at HWY and doesn't touch London at all, but would it have been a problem if it had started from Marylebone?

Thanks everyone. the mystery is unraveling. So I can catch the following train from BHM :

0820 Birmingham New St - Edinburgh 1221

and alight at Preston, Lancaster or Carlisle changing for the Transpennine Express to Glasgow Central ( arr GLC 12.28 : Glasgow Queen St. - Perth - INV - KYL is my route of choice) . The TPE train originates from Manchester Airport and so is not bound by code 9F / 2V or 8X restrictions. During my journey I cannot use any Virgin service which has departed London Euston before 0905 or any East Coast train which has departed London Kings Cross before 0906. I am also forbidden to use XC trains which depart BHM before 0930 - that is my understanding of John and bb's explanation.

General Zod said:

I am also forbidden to use XC trains which depart BHM before 0930 - that is my understanding of John and bb's explanation.

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You are forbidden from using any CrossCountry trains full-stop, as that would cause code 2V to apply to your ticket which forbids any travel before 0930 (including the 0610 from High Wycombe to Birmingham Moor Street).

button_boxer said:

My initial concern was whether the High Wycombe to Birmingham 0610 was a train that started from London Terminals at a barred time but a second reading of the code made me think that only applies if travelling via London. Now I see that this is irrelevant as the 0610 starts at HWY and doesn't touch London at all, but would it have been a problem if it had started from Marylebone?

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My opinion is that any train which leaves Marylebone Mon-Fri 0301 - 0905 could not be used with this ticket due to this part of Validity code 9F.

Validity code 9F said:

Outward travel Northbound – by any train scheduled to depart London Terminals (except as shown below) before 03:00, between 09:06 and 14:57 inclusive & at or after 18:59. Also allowed at or after 18:15 on Fridays.

http://www.nationalrail.co.uk/pdfs/SSR_9F.pdf

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General Zod said:

I can catch the following train from BHM :

0820 Birmingham New St - Edinburgh 1221

and alight at Preston, Lancaster or Carlisle changing for the Transpennine Express to Glasgow Central ( arr GLC 12.28 : Glasgow Queen St. - Perth - INV - KYL is my route of choice) . The TPE train originates from Manchester Airport and so is not bound by code 9F / 2V or 8X restrictions. During my journey I cannot use any Virgin service which has departed London Euston before 0905 or any East Coast train which has departed London Kings Cross before 0906.

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I agree with all the above.

General Zod said:

I am also forbidden to use XC trains which depart BHM before 0930.

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No. Restriction code 2V or 8X applies to journeys from southern England via Birmingham on CrossCountry. If you were to use CrossCountry only from Haymarket to Glasgow as part of this journey, you could not be said to have travelled from southern England via Birmingham on CrossCountry, so neither code would apply.

I also don't know how one decides whether 2V or 8X applies to any particular journey from southern England via Birmingham on CrossCountry.

button_boxer said:

You are forbidden from using any CrossCountry trains full-stop, as that would cause code 2V to apply to your ticket which forbids any travel before 0930 (including the 0610 from High Wycombe to Birmingham Moor Street).

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I don't agree for the two reasons I have given above.

Just a quick update :

The Virgin booking site offered me a weekday Super Off Peak Return HWY-KYL ( via BHM ) 0610 departure from High Wycombe. I emailed Virgin regarding the restrictions of this ticket and its validity to catch the 0920 to EDB from BHM. They replied very swiftly:

Thank you for your recent email.

I understand your concern. However, please note that when a ticket is being highlighted for a particular journey that means the same is valid for that journey.

If you require any further assistance, please feel free to contact us.

I wish you a safe and enjoyable journey

Kind regards

Which implies that if the Virgin booking site is willing to sell you the ticket then the itinerary which accompanies it is also valid.