DynamicSpirit
Established Member
Absolutely it is more an older generation thing but I also think it is about accessibility and the ability to have a "one stop shop" for travel queries, questions and ticketing with a real person.
I'm not sure it's just an older generation thing. I'm usually happy to buy from a ticket machine if I can, but for the vast majority of rail journeys I've made over the past year, the ticket machines are unable to sell me the ticket I want whereas a ticket office will readily sell it to me - and that's my prime reason for preferring ticket offices. Plus telling a human being what I want to buy is usually quicker than navigating ticket machine menus. As for online - in some cases, it's also not possible to buy the ticket I want online, but to be honest I find going through online journey planners a huge time-wasting faff compared to just rolling up at a ticket office and telling them what ticket I want. I typically only buy online if I want an advance ticket, or if I want a cycle reservation on a long distance train for which cycle reservations are compulsory and it's therefore prudent to book in advance.
If online websites provided a speedy option to just specify your origin and destination stations and select the ticket type and railcard (from the full range of tickets, including specific-operator tickets) without having to use a journey planner first, then maybe I'd buy online more often.