"Anytime" Day Return with 16-25 Railcard

[Kristofferson]

Hi guys, I'm hoping a ticketing guru can help with the below...

If I buy an Anytime Day Return from my local station (Kings Langley) to Euston with a 16-25 Railcard (£11.40), is it valid for journeys in the morning peak?

The "Anytime" nature of the ticket suggests it is, and the Railcard is valid for travel at anytime of day, but the Railcard has a minimum fare of £12 between 4.30am and 10am Mon-Fri.

Will my "Anytime" ticket be rejected by the barriers at Euston at 8:45am on a weekday as £11.40 is below the minimum fare?

Thanks in advance chaps.

 

[Merseysider]

At £11.40, not valid.
At £12.00, the minimum fare, valid.

Online booking engines won't sell you a 16-25 discounted ticket <£12 fare with an itinerary before 10:00.
Clerks won't sell you the ticket <£12 unless they're new to the job/forget the restriction.

 

[Kristofferson]

Thanks Jake.

Online booking engines will sell the ticket if you choose a later departure time, which isn't printed on the ticket etc.

So the "long and short" of it is a guard will see the ticket as not valid, and the barrier will reject it?

 

[Crossover]

The barrier probably wouldn't reject it, as they are probably not encoded to the degree required to determine the minimum fare

However, that isn't to say it is valid and a guard should reject it as such

I'm not sure what the appropriate resolution to this would be (i.e. excess, new ticket etc)

 

[Merseysider]

Your mileage may vary.

I've only twice travelled with a railcard discounted ticket before 10:00 with a fare less than £12. Both occasions, from Manchester, the barriers (Liverpool, and Chester) rejected it but staff didn't seem to notice and let me through.

Some barriers are set to reject all discounted tickets and others will accept anything passed through it.

Whether the correct action is to be excessed up to £12, or sold a new ticket entirely, or excessed up to the undiscounted ticket price, is a bit of a grey area.

 

[Kristofferson]

Thanks, I'd imagine Euston's barriers are fairly watertight and will reject the ticket.

My next thought is to buy a ticket starting from the next station up the line (Apsley) and start short on the outward/stop short on the return.

Does anyone envisage an issue with this, bearing in mind KGL doesn't have ticket barriers?

 

[Paul Kelly]

Why can't you buy the Kings Langley ticket with the minimum fare applied?

 

[ainsworth74]

I was wondering that. It's only 60p...

 

[Kristofferson]

I would happily do that, but am I correct in thinking I'd have to do this at a ticket office?

Unless anyone knows how to do it on the booking engines!

 

[Paul Kelly]

Which booking engine are you using? Seems fairly clear on London Midland's site (see attachment).

 

[Crossover]

I would happily do that, but am I correct in thinking I'd have to do this at a ticket office?

Unless anyone knows how to do it on the booking engines!

Just select a travel time pre 10am on a weekday and the booking engines will offer it!

EDIT: Could the OP also specify KGL in full the first time they use it - I had in mind it was Kings Lynn!

 

[Kristofferson]

Ah so the issue was I just needed to select "see more expensive fares..." Thanks all, apologies for wasting your time slightly..!

FWIW, I'm using red spotted hanky for booking as it's a daily commute, so the reward scheme is worthwhile over time.

Will edit my first post with station name for anyone who finds this later.

 

[Be3G]

Whilst it's sadly moot now as autumn approaches, I'll just point out that the 16–25 minimum fare doesn't apply during July and August, which can cause inconsistencies if (for example) researching ticket prices online in August yet ultimately deciding to travel in September. Perhaps this has contributed to the perceived problem.

 

[Kristofferson]

Yup that was the issue!

 

[island]

I've only twice travelled with a railcard discounted ticket before 10:00 with a fare less than £12.

That's probably a criminal offence, so I don't recommend it.

 

[Starmill]

That's probably a criminal offence, so I don't recommend it.

Surely the offence is in the attempt to evade a fare.

There would be no problem boarding the train with such a ticket and excessing up to £12 onboard? Certainly not in the case of a starting your journey at station without an open ticket office anyway.

 

[Merseysider]

That's probably a criminal offence, so I don't recommend it.

Neither would I.

It was a case of having a £9.90 SVR and using the return portion back from Manc on the first train outta there, forgetting the minimum fare applied to the return journey as well as the outward. An easy mistake to make

 

[island]

Surely the offence is in the attempt to evade a fare.

There would be no problem boarding the train with such a ticket and excessing up to £12 onboard? Certainly not in the case of a starting your journey at station without an open ticket office anyway.

If the station has an open ticket office, it would be an offence to join the train without a valid ticket

 

[button_boxer]

If the station has an open ticket office, it would be an offence to join the train without a valid ticket

I was under the impression that if you hold a ticket that would be valid except for a time restriction then you can get it excessed on board with no penalty (ref)? I guess the complicating factor here is whether an excess from the fully discounted fare up to the same ticket with a £12 minimum counts as a "change of ticket type".

 

[island]

Hmm. I suppose that could be argued.

 

[andrewkeith5]

This is a slightly tricky subject I think. The best implementation I have seen so far is Southern - the last time I travelled before 10am, the fully discounted fare was something like £10.40, however if you selected it all the pre-10am services were greyed out. There was, however, a discounted ticket priced at £12.00 which allowed travel - still a discount, just not quite as much.

 

[Hyphen]

I know you're using RSH to purchase the tickets, but for others' reference - some ticket machines (certainly the Scheidt & Bachmann ones) will warn you about and apply the minimum fare if purchasing before 10am - annoyingly even if you don't intend to travel before 10am.

What they're not clever enough to do though, is let you know if the undiscounted fare is cheaper than the minimum-priced railcard ticket, and will sell you the £12 ticket regardless.

 

[maniacmartin]

What they're not clever enough to do though, is let you know if the undiscounted fare is cheaper than the minimum-priced railcard ticket, and will sell you the £12 ticket regardless.

Some machines do warn you about this. Certainly when I used to commute on daily tickets from Oxford a few years ago the machine did bring up this warning.

 

[Hyphen]

Some machines do warn you about this. Certainly when I used to commute on daily tickets from Oxford a few years ago the machine did bring up this warning.

Good to know, thank you!

Were they S&B machines? I seem to recall FGW using different types in different places, and I'm only really familiar with the ones EMT and ATW use.