Any Permitted cheaper than Route ticket

[telstarbox]

Sorry if this is a very basic question.

For Bolton to Blackburn, the Anytime Day Return and Single are both available as an "Any Permitted" and "Via Preston". The Any Permitted is cheaper in both cases. All tickets are priced by Northern.

Can the Any Permitted be used via Preston anyway? If so, what is the use of the Via Preston ticket?

 

[SickyNicky]

Can the Any Permitted be used via Preston anyway? If so, what is the use of the Via Preston ticket?

Bolton to Blackburn is only valid on map MH, which doesn't include Preston. So an ANY PERMITTED ticket wouldn't be valid that way.

The VIA PRESTON ticket exists to allow the journey to go that way, at a higher cost.

 

[LexyBoy]

In this case the routed ticket is allowing extra routeing validity on top of the routes permitted by the Routeing Guide (and the Via Preston ticket is valid by any of the RG permitted routes too).

There are examples where there is a route-specific fare which is more expensive than the Any Permitted. I'm having a bit of a brainfreeze at the moment and can't remember the arguments around this - one would expect it to be valid but in section F, example 3 of the Routeing Guide it states that the "Any Permitted" is not valid if there's a route-specific fare at a higher price. (This reasoning is however absent from section A)

 

[Solent&Wessex]

In this case the routed ticket is allowing extra routeing validity on top of the routes permitted by the Routeing Guide (and the Via Preston ticket is valid by any of the RG permitted routes too).

There are examples where there is a route-specific fare which is more expensive than the Any Permitted. I'm having a bit of a brainfreeze at the moment and can't remember the arguments around this - one would expect it to be valid but in section F, example 3 of the Routeing Guide it states that the "Any Permitted" is not valid if there's a route-specific fare at a higher price. (This reasoning is however absent from section A)

Bentham to Leeds.

There are 2 fares. Rte Any Permitted and a more expensive Rte Via Skipton.

There is only one permitted route, which is via Skipton.

 

[All Line Rover]

An Any Permitted ticket is valid via any mapped route. It's validity is unaffected by the existence of other tickets. If a higher priced route-specific ticket exists for a mapped route, that fare is pointless, although many
booking engines don't realise this.

It's only appropriate to use a higher priced route-specific ticket when it allows travel via a route not normally permitted by the Routeing Guide.

 

[34D]

An Any Permitted ticket is valid via any mapped route. It's validity is unaffected by the existence of other tickets. If a higher priced route-specific ticket exists for a mapped route, that fare is pointless, although many
booking engines don't realise this.

It's only appropriate to use a higher priced route-specific ticket when it allows travel via a route not normally permitted by the Routeing Guide.

Indeed. But if a 'proper' simplification were ever done, then 'any permitted' ought to give better validity than other named tickets. The cheaper ticket in this case ought be to 'route entwistle' in my view. An easement (or a RG change) would of course be needed to allow the ticket (formerly route preston, to be renamed route any permitted) to be used via Preston. Naturally, as part of such a simplification exercise, those tickets that are the same price for less validity would either be corrected or removed.

 

[SickyNicky]

Naturally, as part of such a simplification exercise, those tickets that are the same price for less validity would either be corrected or removed.

I agree in principle. The danger with such an exercise is that it would expose some of the situations where the anomoly is created because the routed ticket has increased in price above inflation every year for several years, whilst the Any Permitted ticket has been kept at a reasonable level.

In such cases we may find that the pricing managers raise the price of the Any Permitted ticket rather than lowering the price of the routed ticket. This tends to be the reaction of TOCs to anomolies - the lower priced ticket "must" be the problem, so let's jack up the price.