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Advance Ticket + Connections - Flexible?

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Hello y'all, I have a question I seem to not have found the answer to on this site, and some advice would be helpful.

I'm looking to travel from Cambridge to Manchester via Ely and East Midlands Trains, the suggested itinerary would be to depart at 07:23, reach Ely at 07:38 and connect to the 07:44, which seems a bit tight for my liking especially if a platform change is required. As an advance ticket I understand that I'm required to travel on the booked train, however the reservation only shows the 07:44 EMT train from Ely and not the 07:23 connecting train on Greater Anglia from Cambridge. My question would be - if I were to get an earlier train from Cambridge to Ely (within reason - maybe about 15 minutes) and wait the extra time at Ely for the 07:44 train, would this be absolutely valid?

Thanks in advance!
 
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Merseysider

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Yes; your ticket is valid on the booked train and appropriate connecting services.

As an example, if the journey were to be tomorrow, you could take the 0704 CBG - ELY 0718 without penalty, rather than waiting for the 0723.
 
Joined
25 Apr 2017
Messages
212
Location
Mainly SE Asia, occasionally Central Belt
Yes; your ticket is valid on the booked train and appropriate connecting services.

As an example, if the journey were to be tomorrow, you could take the 0704 CBG - ELY 0718 without penalty, rather than waiting for the 0723.

Thank you for the prompt response - good to know I'm on the safe side of my ticket! :D Curious - is there a hard rule for what "appropriate" would be in terms of the connection time (e.g. a max of X minutes, anything more and it would be invalid) or is it left open to interpretation?
 

Merseysider

Established Member
Fares Advisor
Joined
22 Jan 2014
Messages
5,388
Location
Birmingham
Thank you for the prompt response - good to know I'm on the safe side of my ticket! :D Curious - is there a hard rule for what "appropriate" would be in terms of the connection time (e.g. a max of X minutes, anything more and it would be invalid) or is it left open to interpretation?
There's no fixed time limit per se, but I personally wouldn't risk pushing it by anything more than an hour or so unless there was a good reason (infrequent/unreliable route, having a meal at interchange station, etc).

We had one person a while ago ask if an 8 hour gap through London would be reasonable (and go to work in the meantime!) which was clearly not :lol:
 
Joined
25 Apr 2017
Messages
212
Location
Mainly SE Asia, occasionally Central Belt
There's no fixed time limit per se, but I personally wouldn't risk pushing it by anything more than an hour or so unless there was a good reason (infrequent/unreliable route, having a meal at interchange station, etc).

We had one person a while ago ask if an 8 hour gap through London would be reasonable (and go to work in the meantime!) which was clearly not :lol:

Thanks for the advice :) I'm just glad they're not forcing me onto the 6-minute connection.. :lol: and yeah I just read that, that's certainly an extreme case, def won't try that in mine! :p
 
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