Does anyone one have access to definitive information as to whether or not Interrail tickets are valid on the Heathrow Express? The Interrail journey planner app produces routes using HEX. I phoned HEX and they said not valid, however I was not entirely convinced by the level of knowledge of the call handler. I beleive there has been some sort of change of status of HEX of late, so this may be adding to the confusion.
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Interrail and Heathrow Express
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cactustwirly
Established Member
If it's in the journey planner, then it should be valid
From intetrail web site so it appears you are fine
Below is a list of train types that a IR Pass for Great Britain is valid to use
No reservations required:
Below is a list of train types that a IR Pass for Great Britain is valid to use
No reservations required:
- c2c
- Chiltern Railways
- Gatwick Express
- Great Northern
- Heathrow Express
- London Northwestern Railway
- London Overground
- Merseyrail
- Northern
- ScotRail
- Southern
- South Western Railway
- TfL Rail/Crossrail
- Thameslink
- West Midlands Railway
However the same site states
You can use your Interrail Pass on Heathrow Connect to travel between Paddington and Heathrow Airport
which implies an issue
There aren't anymore ticket inspections in Standard Class AFAIK from speaking to ex-colleagues at HEX.
Mainline421
Member
That page on the Interrail site looks incorrect, has something major changed or is this an error?
Interrail.eu said:
Well it gets more interesting. After phoning HEX and being told it wasn’t valid, I emailed them. The reply was still in the negative. I then discovered the site myinterrail.co.uk, as opposed to interrail.eu - it seems the former is operated by National Rail, which is a brand of the Rail Delivery Group (aka ATOC). This is the UK representation of Interrail. So I rang them. They said they would look into it and call me back. Much to my surprise they rang back within half an hour and said they had done some digging and the pass is valid on all RDG member routes, and HEX is a member. I now have an email from them stating the pass is valid in HEX. Shame HEX don’t know.....
According to the Man in Seat 61, we have the RDG to thank for those supposed reservation requirements, and indeed it seems unlikely that Eurail would have made them up on their own.
In practice the whole thing is rather confusing, though - all non-English-language Interrail/Eurail pages still have the old information that no reservations are required apart from the sleepers, and indeed
National Rail's own (!) copy of the page doesn't mention the reservations requirements, either. (Although at the same time this also means that their info regarding validity on Heathrow Express is out of date, too... hm... sleeping dogs and so forth).
If you try the Interrail Journey Planner (which is advertised as the cool way to find out which services require reservations), that thankfully doesn't seem to show any domestic UK trains as actually being "Reservation required", though. Plus as the Man in Seat 61 mentioned, Interrail passes alone are already exotic enough that it's unlikely that staff will actually know about those putative reservation requirements, so in practice it should be safe to ignore and/or feign ignorance about them if necessary. (And of course those TOCs that aren't purely intercity, like Great Western or East Midlands Trains, will operate a number of services which aren't reservable in the first place).
It's still a rather worrying development, though, and I wonder what prompted it? Have there really been hordes of Interrail travellers descending on those trains, do they want to boost sales of Britrail passes, which don't carry such a similar restriction, is somebody dreaming of a reservations-compulsory world (see the recent Virgin Trains proposals) and starting with some small, easily overlooked target ...??
Kite159
Veteran Member
Although the issue will be gaining access to platforms 6 & 7 at Paddington via the gateline staff
Mainline421
Member
It is extremely concerning and I can't see any reason why except the last one. All trains are still explicitly shown as "No reservation needed" on Interrail's own app and the conditions only reference the operator not interrail.eu regarding reservations, so I can only assume this isn't rule, but a bizarre bizzare attempt to get the idea that you have to get a reservation for long distance services into the public psyche. Indeed I would be surprised if GWR, GA, and EMT would approve something implying you need a reservation for all of their services considering the amount of non-reservable services they operate! I have emailed [email protected] to inform them of the error on their site without mentioning where contradictory (correct) info can be found and I encourage others to do the same.
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