Euston to Manchester via Reading

[Waverley125]

So an interesting one here. I have an EUS-MAN OPS (AP) booked for tomorrow. With a 26-30 Railcard it comes to £45.25 I've had an emergency meeting put in the diary in Reading, so was looking at alternative ticketing arrangements.

Having consulted this thread: https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/london-to-manchester-permitted-routes.129475/ it looks like via Reading is valid, which I wanted to confirm using a journey planner.

Both the LNER website and NRQ App throw up an OPS EUS-MAN (AP) if specified via Reading - however this ticket costs £47.25, £2 more than the ticket I have.

I've then gone to Euston Travel Centre, who've advised that the ticket is not valid via Reading, and that I'll need a new ticket. I've pointed out that both LNER and NRQ say it is valid, they've 'double checked' - which they said was ringing up XC to ask if it was valid, who came back with the 'no'.

Who's right here? I presume XC are saying no without checking the RG and because they want the RDG-MAN OPS - which is £61.20 with a railcard.

Is this just a case of operators trying to push people into buying new, more expensive tickets, hoping they don't work out that there's a cheaper valid fare for their journey?

 

[jfollows]

The ticket you have is routed "ANY PERMITTED"

The routes defined in the routeing guide for London to Manchester are

This includes RG+RM, London to Reading followed by Reading to Manchester.
Your ticket is valid via Reading.
Of course, you must follow the 9I restrictions.


EDIT See maps at https://data.atoc.org/routeing-maps

 

[Waverley125]

Thanks, but that doesn't ease my mind regarding the price differential of the fare. Why's that there? If you remove the 'via RDG' spec from the journey planner, it comes up at £45.25 for what is (it seems) the same ticket.

The ticket you have is routed "ANY PERMITTED"
View attachment 111864
The routes defined in the routeing guide for London to Manchester are
View attachment 111863
This includes RG+RM, London to Reading followed by Reading to Manchester.
Your ticket is valid via Reading.

EDIT See maps at https://data.atoc.org/routeing-maps

 

[jfollows]

Thanks, but that doesn't ease my mind regarding the price differential of the fare. Why's that there? If you remove the 'via RDG' spec from the journey planner, it comes up at £45.25 for what is (it seems) the same ticket.

I can not find a fare priced at £47.25, do you have more details on what this is?
EDIT Is it priced with origin Euston and a maltese cross, for example, so the £2 is the tube fare add-on?

 

[Haywain]

The ticket quoted at the higher price will probably include an underground fare to Zone U1 to allow travel to Euston.

But please use ticket names and route names - to start with, at least - as the abbreviations ("OPS (AP)") are confusing and conflict with recognised codes.

 

[jfollows]

The ticket quoted at the higher price will probably include an underground fare to Zone U1 to allow travel to Euston.

But please use ticket names and route names - to start with, at least - as the abbreviations ("OPS (AP)") are confusing and conflict with recognised codes.

Agreed in both cases, I had to guess what the OP was meaning ...... I think I guessed right though!

 

[Waverley125]

Apologies, yes - journey specified as originating at Euston.

Off-Peak Single, routed Any Permitted. So it's the tube fare. Which given I'll be going straight to Paddington, I don't need anyway.

 

[jfollows]

Euston Travel Centre and XC are both wrong because the question is too difficult for them to answer and it's safer to say "no" than to say yes. Or because staff are making things up when they don't know.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Euston Travel Centre and XC are both wrong because the question is too difficult for them to answer and it's safer to say "no" than to say yes. Or because staff are making things up when they don't know.

Or because they're assuming that a "component" fare being higher renders it invalid, which it doesn't. I believe it did in BR days, however.

 

[jfollows]

Or because they're assuming that a "component" fare being higher renders it invalid, which it doesn't. I believe it did in BR days, however.

Fair enough.
However Paddington-Reading-Manchester has been a valid route for ever - literally, I think, meaning "since the routeing guide was formalised" and I used to travel London-Oxford-Manchester back in 1980, so it's hardly an unusual route.
Also, now getting off-topic a bit as usual, I suspect in BR days the journey price was lower with two separate tickets London-Reading and Reading-Manchester than the direct London-Manchester fare. It's only more recently with XC's pricing that the Reading-Manchester fare is greater than the London-Manchester fare in this case, which seems bonkers to me!

 

[Hadders]

London Terminals to Manchester is absolutely valid via Reading.

 

[Waverley125]

Fair enough.
However Paddington-Reading-Manchester has been a valid route for ever - literally, I think, meaning "since the routeing guide was formalised" and I used to travel London-Oxford-Manchester back in 1980, so it's hardly an unusual route.
Also, now getting off-topic a bit as usual, I suspect in BR days the journey price was lower with two separate tickets London-Reading and Reading-Manchester than the direct London-Manchester fare. It's only more recently with XC's pricing that the Reading-Manchester fare is greater than the London-Manchester fare in this case, which seems bonkers to me!

Yeah, the fact it's £61.20 for an Off-Peak Single up to Manchester is what confused me.

 

[itfcfan]

Will the original poster run into any problems, given his ticket is printed as from "Euston" instead of "London Terminals"? Does it make any difference to the valid routes?

 

[jfollows]

Will the original poster run into any problems, given his ticket is printed as from "Euston" instead of "London Terminals"? Does it make any difference to the valid routes?

No, it makes no difference to the valid routes. There is no London Euston-Manchester ANY PERMITTED off-peak single ticket.

Of course, the OP may run into problems for a variety of reasons, so it'd be wise to be prepared anyway! (EG print a valid itinerary for the ticket and/or the appropriate bits of the routeing guide, I'd do the latter but nowadays most people favour the former)

Please let us know how you get on tomorrow!

Yeah, the fact it's £61.20 for an Off-Peak Single up to Manchester is what confused me.

The corollary of this, and I've just checked, is the totally bonkers situation that a Reading-Manchester off-peak single "not via London" priced by XC is £92.50 undiscounted, whereas a Reading-Manchester off-peak single "+via London" priced by Avanti West Coast is £78.60 undiscounted.
I'm sure in BR days the Reading-Manchester "via London" was more expensive than the "not via London", but that's XC's pricing structure to blame I think.

 

[voyagerdude220]

Apologies for repetition-

But as others have already said- London to Manchester off peak railcard single at £47.25 Is valid via Reading. I've checked on Journey Planner (the software my TOC ticket machine uses) and it confirms it being valid.

Probably not the first time London Euston ticket office/barrier staff have given incorrect info to pax.

 

[Watershed]

The reason why the price of the XC fare from Reading is higher is that a year or two back, Avanti cut the cost of their Off-Peak Single fares to be 70% of the Off-Peak Return. This was their rather half-hearted attempt at single leg pricing, but nevertheless it does have some use-cases.

XC did not engage in the same cut, and hence on flows where there are both Avanti and XC priced fares (typically '+via London' and 'not via London') it is often cheaper to buy the Avanti-set fares. The irony of course being that in many cases, despite being routed 'via London', the Avanti-set fare would still be valid on XC - owing to the longstanding validity of tickets from the "SWR" region to London via Basingstoke and Reading, and of tickets from London to destinations on the WCML via Reading and Banbury.

But to come back to the OP's question, yes, a London to Manchester Any Permitted ticket is valid out of Paddington via Reading and then on XC. The price of intermediate fares has no relevance to the validity of a ticket - for example, there are numerous instance where Advances are only available for longer journeys, meaning that someone travelling from London to Reading may pay more than someone travelling on the same train from London to Swindon.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

Any break of journey issues if using this London Terminals-> Manchester Stns (route Any Permitted) Off Peak Single product via Reading?

 

[Watershed]

Any break of journey issues if using this Off Peak Single product via Reading?

Obviously I wouldn't expect it to automatically work the barriers, but it's a valid route and there are no BoJ restrictions, so you should be let through.

 

[jfollows]

The reason why the price of the XC fare from Reading is higher is that a year or two back, Avanti cut the cost of their Off-Peak Single fares to be 70% of the Off-Peak Return. This was their rather half-hearted attempt at single leg pricing, but nevertheless it does have some use-cases.

XC did not engage in the same cut, and hence on flows where there are both Avanti and XC priced fares (typically '+via London' and 'not via London') it is often cheaper to buy the Avanti-set fares. The irony of course being that in many cases, despite being routed 'via London', the Avanti-set fare would still be valid on XC - owing to the longstanding validity of tickets from the "SWR" region to London via Basingstoke and Reading, and of tickets from London to destinations on the WCML via Reading and Banbury.

Ah yes, thank you for this explanation. This was also when they (Avanti) got rid of the SVH wasn't it? May 2020 I think.

Ironically one use case is that Oxford-Manchester is only ~£2 more expensive via London, which was always my preferred route back in the day anyway, when the price difference was significant!