GWR Advance prices got cheaper since I bought them

[trainophile]

I have Taunton to Paignton Advances on the 11:37 on 15th July, and Paignton to Taunton on the 10:54 on 23rd July, that I paid £5.90 each for (with railcard). Bought on the TPE website on 3rd May.

On checking today, the prices shown for the exact same trains/journeys/dates are now £5.10 and £4.35 respectively. So had I waited I would have saved £2.35. This is hardly in the spirit of Advance fares is it? Do I have a valid complaint if I take it up with either GWR or TPE?

(I have a feeling I've seen a similar thread not too long ago but blowed if I can find it, apologies if there is one.)

 

[jfollows]

It's entirely within the spirit of Advance fares, surely?

Tickets are priced to meet a perceived demand, but if the demand is lower than forecast then the prices get reduced to match the demand.

I don't see any grounds for complaint here.

 

[Starmill]

It depends on whether or not you believed you were sold the ticket on the basis that the price was lower the further in advance you booked. If you were then there's plainly a possibility of unfairness in the contract. If you weren't then this seems very unlikely.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

The National Rail website does say (inter alia)...

"In general, the further ahead you book, the cheaper the Advance fare will be."

Link... https://www.nationalrail.co.uk/times_fares/ticket_types/46583.aspx

Couple of possibly weasel words there!

 

[trainophile]

Thanks for your interesting points of view. I'm not actually going to bother making a fuss about a couple of quid, but I do believe the common perception (whether incorrect or not) is that you should buy your Advances as soon as they are released if you want the cheapest fares. In the old days (not sure if this happens now) Advances were priced in tiers and the cheapest ones for any given journey obviously sold first, then the system moved on to sell the next price tier.

 

[jfollows]

I think the the wording on the National Rail website is correct, and the perception of needing to buy earlier to secure lower fares is generally matched, but the train operators are attempting to extract as much money as they can for each seat sold which will sometimes lead to them reducing the price of their advance tickets when they are unable to sell seats at higher prices - in the end it's better for them to sell a seat for anything over the incremental cost to them of transporting a passenger than to leave the seat unsold.

EDIT with the caveat that you're not explicitly told otherwise, of course, which I don't believe to be the case.

 

[trainophile]

Wish I'd bought them on Trainsplit now as they tell you how many are left "at this price". Would be an interesting comparison to see whether the subsequent cheaper ones are more or less available than the initial higher priced batch.

 

[jfollows]

Also, in the original post, trainophile was originally "happy" to have paid £11.80 for the tickets. The fact that they can now be bought for £9.45 is irrelevant to the original transaction. It might seem a bit annoying, but if the original price was acceptable, what's the real problem here?

 

[trainophile]

Also, in the original post, trainophile was originally "happy" to have paid £11.80 for the tickets. The fact that they can now be bought for £9.45 is irrelevant to the original transaction. It might seem a bit annoying, but if the original price was acceptable, what's the real problem here?

That's one way of putting it. However I was "happy" because I thought that was the cheapest I could get them, and I needed them regardless. Finding out subsequently that this isn't the case rankles a bit.

 

[jfollows]

That's one way of putting it. However I was "happy" because I thought that was the cheapest I could get them, and I needed them regardless. Finding out subsequently that this isn't the case rankles a bit.

I understand - and this means that you'll change your behaviour next time in all probability - you might be annoyed enough not to travel by train at all, or at least you might be annoyed enough to buy from someone else, and you won't "trust" the same seller to the same extent in future I'm sure. Even so, this might be factored into the algorithms which caused the price to drop - it'd be highly involved but it's an interesting thought experiment (to me, anyway).

 

[trainophile]

Nope, I will continue to buy train tickets and hope any "losses" are as minimal as this one. I don't drive and am not planning on stopping my travels. The only difference might be if I find out on Trainsplit that there's 15 tickets left "at this price" I might delay buying for a little while just in case it happens again.

It's swings and roundabouts really, I've had some excellent bargains too over the years.

It's coupled with another dilemma - I also need a Hereford to Taunton Anytime Return for the same trip. I have to use specific trains to tie in with my Advances, and if I leave it too late there might be no availability on GWR with its compulsory reservations. However if Boris decides to curtail travel in the next few days then that will be £31 wasted, so I'd rather leave it until we know what he's got lined up.

I don't think GWR are as rigid as XC with the reservations thing but don't want to be caught out.

 

[jfollows]

It's coupled with another dilemma - I also need a Hereford to Taunton Anytime Return for the same trip. I have to use specific trains to tie in with my Advances, and if I leave it too late there might be no availability on GWR with its compulsory reservations. However if Boris decides to curtail travel in the next few days then that will be £31 wasted, so I'd rather leave it until we know what he's got lined up.

I don't think GWR are as rigid as XC with the reservations thing but don't want to be caught out.

I think at the moment it's unlikely that Boris will re-introduce any travel restrictions, although of course this should become clearer on Monday - I think he's going to step back from reducing restrictions further for a number of weeks.

Not that (a) I'm any wiser than you are here or (b) anything Boris says or has ever said should be assumed to have any connection with the truth in any way, other than by accident!

 

[XAM2175]

What happens to advance tickets that are cancelled after purchase - do those tickets become available again for purchase in the pricing tier in which they were originally sold, or the tier prevailing at the time they're presented for resale?

 

[alistairlees]

What happens to advance tickets that are cancelled after purchase - do those tickets become available again for purchase in the pricing tier in which they were originally sold, or the tier prevailing at the time they're presented for resale?

Most likely they will become available again, subject to any rules set up by the TOC in the availability system. Assuming that there were no rules preventing them from becoming available again, then this is what most likely happened here, as a consequence of another customer doing a Change of Journey (CoJ) for their Advance tickets to another time and / or date.

It's also possible that the TOC decided to release some cheaper tiers of tickets, after it had already started selling higher priced tiers of tickets. However, it should not be doing this (and there used to be an industry memo that I can no longer find explicitly banning this), because it causes exactly the sort of problem that trainophile has described. It would also make a mockery of the RSP requirement to state how many tickets are left "at this price", which gives a sense of urgency, if there are (or will be) tickets available at lower prices. This would cause trust in TOCs (already not very high) to decline further.

 

[Starmill]

I think this behaviour has become more common in recent years, where an Advance ticket is changed or 'cancelled' and then goes back on sale immediately, because more retailers offer changes without any fees, and because etickets have increased the speed at which this can happen (i.e. fewer people using post or ToD).

 

[daveo]

Neither alistairlees nor Starmill have answered XAM2175's most recent question - "do those tickets become available again for purchase in the pricing tier in which they were originally sold, or the tier prevailing at the time they're presented for resale?"

 

[alistairlees]

Neither alistairlees nor Starmill have answered XAM2175's most recent question - "do those tickets become available again for purchase in the pricing tier in which they were originally sold, or the tier prevailing at the time they're presented for resale?"

As I said, it depends on how things are set up.

 

[trainophile]

Well Trainsplit says there are currently "plenty of seats" left at the £5.10 price on the outbound, and six seats left at £4.35 on the return, so hardly just a couple of odd ones that someone changed their mind about.

 

[yorkie]

In general there is no issue here; it's generally accepted that airline fares can go up as well as down (and many airlines boast their prices are simple)

However the key question, as others have said, is have GWR advertised that it's always cheaper to buy further in advance? If they have, and you bought the ticket on that basis, you potentially have a valid claim. If not, I don't see how you have a valid complaint.

 

[trainophile]

Well as with most people, I didn't set out to check the T&Cs when I searched for the tickets I needed. Therefore I have to concede that it was probably just bad luck. However the whole principle of buying Advances needs clarifying if this sort of thing can happen frequently.

 

[yorkie]

If you are saying you don't recall being told they are always cheaper when bought further in advance, I don't see an issue.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

GWR's website mentions the following....

"There may be rare occasions where a cheaper Advance fare becomes available closer to the time of travel, for example if a group booking is cancelled and extra seats become available.

Please note that in these circumstances Advance tickets that have already been bought cannot be refunded in part or in full."

Link... https://www.gwr.com/your-tickets/choosing-your-ticket/advance-tickets

 

[trainophile]

If you are saying you don't recall being told they are always cheaper when bought further in advance, I don't see an issue.

As a general principle yes that was my understanding, but I couldn't quote chapter and verse on the matter, and I doubt anyone else could when making a purchase that they have made hundreds of times before, ensuring they buy as soon as the tickets are released on the principle that this will be the cheapest they get.

Thanks @Mcr Warrior, I'm sceptical about the inference that this situation arose due to a cancelled group booking, but hey ho...

Advance single tickets are one way tickets available on many of our most popular routes. They’re great value, and numbers are limited, so you’ll need to be quick.

From the link above. I would say they are on dodgy ground if they are going to move the goalposts in this way more than just very infrequently and for a genuine reason as stated, e.g. group booking cancelled, not just because they felt like it.

 

[yorkie]

I am not sure that statement is misleading unless it can be demonstrated it's not rare.

Do you book GWR Advance fares often and does it appear to happen more commonly than rarely?

If we have evidence that it's not rare, then I think they ought to be challenged on this, but at present I am not sure we do?

 

[trainophile]

No, I don't use GWR all that often actually, but I just find it surprising that the number of cheaper Advances still currently available according to Trainsplit would have been due to a cancelled group booking, especially the "plenty of seats" - obviously I can't prove it but that says to me that it wasn't a cancelled group booking!

 

[P Binnersley]

From "The small print" on Advance tickets from GWR's Website

• prices normally increase closer to travel. Occasionally, though, they may go down. For example, if there is a seat sale

So regrettably I don't think the OP has a case.

 

[trainophile]

Yep, it's a fair cop then. Just a bit of a disillusion about the concept of setting the alarm early on ticket release days!

 

[alistairlees]

There is no seat sale, though.

 

[voyagerdude220]

I know it's unlikely but is a possibility that someone had placed advance tickets in their basket for the cheaper price advance singles, in the meantime the OP has purchased the next more expensive tickets promptly, only for the first person to not complete their transaction, thus releasing the cheaper fares back available?

 

[Hadders]

I might be mis-remembering but a couple of years ago didn't RDG, to some fanfare, state that if you purchased a ticket and at a later date a cheaper ticket became available the train company would refund the difference. I think this was aimed at passengers who purchased flexible tickets due to the late release of Advance tickets. No idea if this is still active, or if it has been dropped, or if I am mistaken.

This case is a little bit different but might be worth checking.