Ticket from Beeston to Haverfordwest

[Sand_elf]

I'm looking to travel to Haverfordwest next week. I'm hoping to camp on the Gower Peninsula on the way back so I need a flexible ticket that allows me to break my return journey at Swansea. However, I've just looked at Trainline and found all the standard trains on Monday are full. I looked at Tuesday instead and tickets are available. However, I want to use the vouchers I got from Transport for Wales for the same journey I made last Christmas that was disrupted because the driver assaulted - they refunded my entire ticket from Beeston to Haverfordwest. It seems I need to reserve the Cross country section of the journey, and the only way I can do that is by buying a ticket from the Cross Country website - i.e. not using my vouchers. Any ideas?

 

[Hadders]

If you want to use a Rail Travel Voucher then you will need to purchase your ticket at a station. I suggest you visit a local station with a ticket office and they should be able to sell you the ticket(s) you need and make reservations on your preferred services.

Technically speaking reservations aren't required on CrossCountry trains but they are strongly advised and it is preferable to have one if you are making a long distance, time sensitive journey.

 

[ForTheLoveOf]

I'm looking to travel to Haverfordwest next week. I'm hoping to camp on the Gower Peninsula on the way back so I need a flexible ticket that allows me to break my return journey at Swansea. However, I've just looked at Trainline and found all the standard trains on Monday are full. I looked at Tuesday instead and tickets are available. However, I want to use the vouchers I got from Transport for Wales for the same journey I made last Christmas that was disrupted because the driver assaulted - they refunded my entire ticket from Beeston to Haverfordwest. It seems I need to reserve the Cross country section of the journey, and the only way I can do that is by buying a ticket from the Cross Country website - i.e. not using my vouchers. Any ideas?

XC have changed their timetable data so that online booking systems require a reservation in order for a ticket to be sold in conjunction with an itinerary on any XC service. They have then limited the number of available reservations to far below the actual socially distanced capacity of their services. As a result many XC services are now showing as "sold out", even though in reality there will still be many socially distanced seats empty on the day - and there are no reports of anyone denied travel on their services due to lacking a reservation.

You can circumvent the requirement to obtain a reservation to buy a ticket, by obtaining your ticket at a booking office or TVM (note, a few TOCs' TVMs now go off itineraries so would have the same issues as booking online, but certainly none of EMR's TVMs). Of course you'll need to visit a ticket office anyway if you are to buy your tickets before travelling using your RTVs. Note that you are permitted to buy on board if there is no open ticket office and you intend to use RTVs.

If you do buy your ticket at the ticket office, you will find that they will have the same difficulties getting you a reservation as you would have online, because they are accessing exactly the same reservation database. So in fact I would suggest not asking them for a reservation with your tickets, because they might refuse to sell you a ticket if they see that reservations are "mandatory" but they can't get you any.

Obtaining a reservation is never a bad idea but I certainly wouldn't be delaying your journey or inconveniencing yourself just to play along with XC's games.

In terms of fares, tickets to Haverfordwest cost the same as to all the other nearby West Wales stations. So you may as well get your ticket issued to Milford Haven (for the same price) in case you end up needing to use the train to/from there. Note that most tickets are interavailable between the Milford Haven, Pembroke and Fishguard lines, so a ticket to Milford Haven would actually be valid along any of those three lines (due to the low service frequency).

Break of journey is permitted on both portions of a ticket from Beeston to Haverfordwest, so you're perfectly OK to make your journey at Swansea on the way back. I can't see that it's any cheaper to split tickets when doing a period return journey so I would just go with a simple through ticket in this instance.

 

[30907]

On a quick check, you can get a reservation for tomorrow on the 16.13 ex Beeston via the normal route or at 15.13 via Birmingham and Hereford.

Your ticket is also valid via the Central Wales line (Shrewsbury-Llanelli) but that only works with a start before 0930 because of the Welsh Covid timetable, so that's probably out. However, it is reservation-free!

 

[Sand_elf]

I've got an open return from the ticket office costing £103.30, departing tomorrow, which I couldn't get online. I think I'll try to get the 11:13 without a seat reservation and hope that's OK.
I've looked at Hereford and shrewsbury as an alternative to Cross Country to Cardiff, but they get into Haverfordwest at the same time. I don't think I can avoid Cross Country into Birmingham unless I go via Stockport, which is not a valid route I don't think.
The ticket office didn't seem to think a lack of a reservation would be too much of a problem, but he gave me a seat reservation for the return journey.

 

[ForTheLoveOf]

I've got an open return from the ticket office costing £103.30, departing tomorrow, which I couldn't get online. I think I'll try to get the 11:13 without a seat reservation and hope that's OK.
I've looked at Hereford and shrewsbury as an alternative to Cross Country to Cardiff, but they get into Haverfordwest at the same time. I don't think I can avoid Cross Country into Birmingham unless I go via Stockport, which is not a valid route I don't think.
The ticket office didn't seem to think a lack of a reservation would be too much of a problem, but he gave me a seat reservation for the return journey.

There won't be any problems. It's just a poorly considered ploy to try and limit online ticket sales.

 

[robbeech]

What’s the latest on travel restrictions on TFW services? Are you likely to have issues on a ‘non essential’ journey ?

 

[ForTheLoveOf]

What’s the latest on travel restrictions on TFW services? Are you likely to have issues on a ‘non essential’ journey ?

Still no notable change to the travel advice (which is broadly still "p*** off"). The only types of journeys on which there may be any difficulty would be the likes of going to Barry Island on a sunny day.