Guildford to London Road Guildford fare anomaly

joncombe · 25 Nov 2019

I noticed planning a journey for Sunday from Guildford to London Road Guildford.

I notice on trains departing Guildford at xx:50 I am quoted a fare of £2.70 "Off Peak" but on trains departing at xx:20 I'm quoted £2.80 "Anytime".

Both trains take 4 minutes so there is no different routing involved.

See e.g. this link, which should work until the 15th December. I appreciate it's only a 10p difference but I don't think there should be a difference in fare at all.

http://ojp.nationalrail.co.uk/service/timesandfares/GLD/LRD/151219/0700/dep

Can anyone help with what is going on here?

I can replicate the results on SWR own website too.

RailUK Forums

JB_B · 25 Nov 2019

It varies according to the final destination of the train. The xx:20s are going to Waterloo - and so the super-off peak ticket isn't valid - see restriction UR http://www.brfares.com/#faredetail?orig=GLD&dest=LRD&tkt=SOG

The xx:50s are only going as far as Surbiton/Wimbledon.

jfollows · 25 Nov 2019

The £2.80 fare is the SDS Anytime Day Single whereas the £2.70 fare is the Weekend Super Off Peak Single which is not valid on trains arriving in London 09:31-11:59. The trains for which the £2.70 fare is not showing are trains destined for London Waterloo whereas the trains for which the £2.70 fare is showing terminate short of London.

As JB_B also said!

CheapAndNerdy · 25 Nov 2019

The £2.70 fare is a Weekend Super Offpeak and cannot be used on trains that are scheduled to arrive at London Terminals before 09:31 (see http://www.brfares.com/#faredetail?orig=GLD&dest=LRD&tkt=SOG). This restriction applies even if your own journey is not to London. The £2.80 ticket has no restrictions.

The fares alternate because the early xx:20 services continue to London Waterloo while the xx:50 services terminate at Wimbledon, so the restriction does not apply.

So it looks odd but I think it is correct.

edit:beaten to it - twice!

joncombe · 25 Nov 2019

Thanks for the update here. I guess the explanation does make sense that the trains are terminating at Wimbledon presumably this is the strike timetable. Though it also seems to apply this coming weekend which isn't flagging on NRE as a strike day, but perhaps it is.

However it does seem like this could be a bit of a can of worms because if arriving at the station you have to know if the train you plan to catch is going to London or not, to choose the cheapest fare.

This isn't always easy since not all staitons have a summary of departures before the ticket barriers. Also I don't know how passengers are even meant to know at some stations if the train is even going to London. For example on the Kingston Loop trains are often advertised as going the train to somewhere other than their destination (e.g. Richmond, Wimbledon, Stawberry Hill). Similar happens on other lines, I think the Poole to Waterloo stopping trains for example are advertised as to Farnborough initially even though they do go to London.

It doesn't seem a very passenger friendly approach if you need to know the destination of the train to select the correct fare and the destination of the train is often hidden!

I guess guards wouldn't bother about it for the most part but RPIs might be a bit more "computer says not valid, pay a penalty fare".

kieron · 25 Nov 2019

For a Guildford-London Road Guildford journey at the weekend, your choices then seem to be:
1. Find out where a train is going before you board.
2. Wait until after 11am to travel.
3. Spend the extra 10p on a super off peak day single.

If you could persuade SWR that it is wrong to offer people this sort of choice, they may be able to do something to alleviate the problem. That isn't to say that you'll like how they do it.

joncombe · 25 Nov 2019

Well yes in this specific case I will do just pay that and pay the 10p extra (as I said in the first post 10p doesn't make a lot of difference!).

But I'm wondering what happens if someone wants to go from, say, New Malden to Kingston. This is served by the Kingston Loop and the Shepperton line. The Shepperton trains will be shown as going to Shepperton so a "Super Off Peak" will be valid on that train. But the Kingston Loop train will be going back to London Waterloo. But it will be advertised as something like Richmond or Twickenham, not London Waterloo. So if you buy a Super Off Peak it will be valid if you take a Shepperton train but not a Kingston Loop, because it goes to London (even though the displays don't show this).

So in order to pick the correct ticket a passenger will have to have a good knowledge of the local network to know the train shown as to Twickenham or Richmond is actually going to London and so the Super Off Peak ticket is not valid. It doesn't seem reasonable to me to expect passengers to make that distinction.

hkstudent · 26 Nov 2019

joncombe said:
Well yes in this specific case I will do just pay that and pay the 10p extra (as I said in the first post 10p doesn't make a lot of difference!).

But I'm wondering what happens if someone wants to go from, say, New Malden to Kingston. This is served by the Kingston Loop and the Shepperton line. The Shepperton trains will be shown as going to Shepperton so a "Super Off Peak" will be valid on that train. But the Kingston Loop train will be going back to London Waterloo. But it will be advertised as something like Richmond or Twickenham, not London Waterloo. So if you buy a Super Off Peak it will be valid if you take a Shepperton train but not a Kingston Loop, because it goes to London (even though the displays don't show this).

So in order to pick the correct ticket a passenger will have to have a good knowledge of the local network to know the train shown as to Twickenham or Richmond is actually going to London and so the Super Off Peak ticket is not valid. It doesn't seem reasonable to me to expect passengers to make that distinction.

That's bad.
Can RP officer issue penalty fare to the passengers on Kingston Loop for the wrong ticket, claiming the train is actually be terminating at London?

Paul Kelly · 26 Nov 2019

joncombe said:
But I'm wondering what happens if someone wants to go from, say, New Malden to Kingston. This is served by the Kingston Loop and the Shepperton line. The Shepperton trains will be shown as going to Shepperton so a "Super Off Peak" will be valid on that train. But the Kingston Loop train will be going back to London Waterloo. But it will be advertised as something like Richmond or Twickenham, not London Waterloo. So if you buy a Super Off Peak it will be valid if you take a Shepperton train but not a Kingston Loop, because it goes to London (even though the displays don't show this).

But there are no Super Off-Peak fares from New Malden to Kingston?

swt_passenger · 26 Nov 2019

Indigo2 said:
But there are no Super Off-Peak fares from New Malden to Kingston?

Isn’t the whole SWT/SWR super offpeak structure only applicable where the travel is to/from “outside the zones”?

kieron · 26 Nov 2019

joncombe said:
Well yes in this specific case I will do just pay that and pay the 10p extra (as I said in the first post 10p doesn't make a lot of difference!).

But I'm wondering what happens if someone wants to go from, say, New Malden to Kingston.

I don't think it matters that much where you're going. If you're in a situation where trains on which a discounted ticket are valid are mixed in with trains on which the ticket is invalid, your choices are the same whatever your intended journey is. Pay for the dearer ticket, wait until they stopped being mixed in like that (where they do, anyway) or check before the train departs.

swt_passenger said:
Isn’t the whole SWT/SWR super offpeak structure only applicable where the travel is to/from “outside the zones”?

Pretty much. There are a couple of exceptions, like a super off peak day return from Ewell West to Ewell East, but that uses a different restriction code anyway.

Western Sunset · 26 Nov 2019

Don't quite understand this. Ewell East - Ewell West off-peak return £4.00 or £13.10 by Travelcard. But Epsom (where one changes) is outside Zone 6. So how is the Travelcard valid?

swt_passenger · 26 Nov 2019

Western Sunset said:
Don't quite understand this. Ewell East - Ewell West off-peak return £4.00 or £13.10 by Travelcard. But Epsom (where one changes) is outside Zone 6. So how is the Travelcard valid?

Presumably by taking the long way round via Wimbledon?

kieron · 26 Nov 2019

Western Sunset said:
Don't quite understand this. Ewell East - Ewell West off-peak return £4.00 or £13.10 by Travelcard. But Epsom (where one changes) is outside Zone 6. So how is the Travelcard valid?

Is this nationalrail.co.uk using the same logic for inboundary travelcard journeys that it uses for outboundary ones? If so, it's valid because it says it is.

Western Sunset · 26 Nov 2019

Gives the same route via Epsom, whether by the off-peak return or travelcard.

swt_passenger · 27 Nov 2019

Western Sunset said:
Gives the same route via Epsom, whether by the off-peak return or travelcard.

Sounds suspect to me, BR fares is showing a normal zone 1-6 travelcard is available for the point to point journey, but that wouldn’t normally be valid at Epsom.

island · 27 Nov 2019

hkstudent said:
That's bad.
Can RP officer issue penalty fare to the passengers on Kingston Loop for the wrong ticket, claiming the train is actually be terminating at London?

No. A penalty fare should not be charged to a passenger travelling at a time of day at which his or her ticket is not valid. An excess fare to the cheapest valid ticket should be charged.

Western Sunset · 27 Nov 2019

Sorry to labour the point about using a Travelcard to travel via Epsom but the National Rail website also shows that Stoneleigh - Cheam also appears to be valid using a Travelcard.

So can a Zone 1-6 Travelcard be used to travel via Epsom for any reasonable journey? Presumably one couldn't exit the station there though.

MikeWh · 27 Nov 2019

Western Sunset said:
So can a Zone 1-6 Travelcard be used to travel via Epsom for any reasonable journey? Presumably one couldn't exit the station there though.

Yes if it's a season ticket stored on an Oyster card. If you exit the station you'd need additional PAYG for the fare.

joncombe · 28 Nov 2019

Indigo2 said:
But there are no Super Off-Peak fares from New Malden to Kingston?

There are probably other examples. I think for instance that the stopping trains to London are adveritsed as to Farnborough at Southampton. So someone wanting to go there purchase a super off peak because the train is showing as terminating at Farnborough, but it would be invalid because the train is going to London.

Either way it doesn't seem helpful to have different fares based on the time a train arrives at stations in London when you are not going to London. Station information displays do not show the arrival time of trains into London and not all stations have the timetables displayed outside the ticket barriers either. I feel SWR should make it clearer which trains a SUper Off Peak ticket is valid on when buying tickets.

I've seen other operators do similar, show a train as "Off Peak" or "Peak".

kieron · 30 Nov 2019

joncombe said:
I feel SWR should make it clearer which trains a SUper Off Peak ticket is valid on when buying tickets.

They could do this by having everyone buy a ticket using a web-site style display, and instructing staff to ask about times when selling an off peak ticket (if they don't already). Apart from that, I don't know what they could do at that point.

joncombe said:
I've seen other operators do similar, show a train as "Off Peak" or "Peak".

I don't think SWR could do that here. SWR use three different restriction codes for weekend super off peak tickets alone, and sometimes even use one ticket for a return starting from one end and a different one for ones starting at the other. This means that they often can't tell if a weekend super off peak is valid on a train until they know more about the ticket, and so can't display this sort of information at the station.

Guildford to London Road Guildford fare anomaly

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