Ah, I hadn't realised the gates might be programmed to reject off peak tickets at peak times.
Are ticket restrictions encoded onto the ticket? Only very limited data is encoded. I was under the impression they weren't, so the barrier has no way of knowing what the restrictions are.
Given there is no unrestricted period return for the journey in question, I would suggest that no excess is possible and the OP SHOULD have been sold a new Single ticket and advised to either apply for a refund of the unused Return portion (which would incur an admin fee) or to retain it for use another time.
This would be contrary to the NRCoC.
If there is evidence the rail industry is not honouring the NRCoC, then my advice to those with evidence are advised contact the DfT (to report franchise breaches) and ORR (to report consumer law not being followed)
Whilst it seems unfair, the rules for "inventing" an Anytime Return by adding together the cost of two Singles have long since disappeared from retail publications.
That would surely be an oversight. I can't believe ATOC are intentionally disregarding the NRCoC...
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I also hold a Gold Card (Lichfield City - Lichfield Trent Valley before the price shot up!) and on the few occasions it's worth using it instead of the DSB railcard, I always find that the barriers reject the ticket regardless of type (code 105, if I recall correctly). But no such problems with DSB discounted tickets of any type.
I
suspect the TOC who control the gatelines can program them to reject specific types of railcard (though LU can't differentiate). This is considered by some in the industry to be bad practice; it's better to set the orange light and do a manual inspection after passing the barrier.
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Having said that, they also don't permit you to excess away a Railcard discount if you forget it, yet some staff will do so, even on Advance tickets.
Again I
suspect this is an oversight.
Though not documented in iKB, it
is the policy of some Train Companies to do this, as it's clearly sensible.
Though some defiantly refuse to apply common sense.
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Yorkie Would you be able to give your take on this. I think this is really interesting. Question: is it 100% allowed to have a TOC specific ticket and then "excess" to a non TOC specific ticket PROVIDED you stick to the inital TOC.
Yes.
Also, was the "day single" the right fare to excess to here given that there really was not any other. Or was this a case of, strictly speaking and as said on here "no excess is possible and the OP SHOULD have been sold a new Single ticket and advised to either apply for a refund of the unused Return portion (which would incur an admin fee) or to retain it for use another time."
NRCoC is clear that an excess fare applies. If the correct excess cannot be calculated, then undercharging the customer is acceptable to me, but overcharging would not be acceptable in my opinion.