Railcards - London to Cambridge Return

[fandroid]

This is one that has me scratching my head.
I am trying to write a guide on ticket buying for my colleagues who need to travel from Kings Cross to Cambridge and back on weekdays. Occasional trips require an overnight stay in Cambridge.

I am using the GWR website to see what it throws up in validity for the various ticket types including (for most of us) Senior Railcards.

I was looking to see what time a national Railcard holder can start the return journey to Kings Cross after an overnight stay in Cambridge. It is throwing up the bizarre (to me anyway) restriction that an Anytime Return from London Terminals with Railcard discount cannot be used before 09.50 for the journey from Cambridge. But it shows Anytime Singles from Cambridge to be valid with Railcard from the 09.20 departure. It's also valid on the 08.55, but that's a stopper.

Any rational explanation please?

 

[30907]

http://www.brfares.com/#!fares?orig=KGX&dest=CBG&rlc=SRN

Click on General Railcard info and you get this (my bold).

Not valid in the morning peak for journeys wholly within the former British Rail Network SouthEast area, until the Off-Peak Day Return fare for the relevant journey becomes available.

I think this is a classic case of fares with different restrictions in different directions. A CBG-KGX fare carries a "no arrival in London before 10.00" restriction rather than a "no travel before 09.29" one. So a ticket issued from CBG can be valid earlier than one issued from KGX.

(Nostalgic example: at least until the early 80's longer distance Day Returns FROM London SR were unrestricted while those INTO London had the 10am rule.)

 

[fandroid]

Thanks 30907. We very rarely set off from London before about 10.00, so I think I'll advise against ever buying an Anytime Return (my normal advice for other routes), and suggest buying two singles for likely overnight stays with an early morning return.

 

[fandroid]

Thinking further on this it does seem fairly bonkers. Is a revenue protection person really going to penalise someone travelling on an Anytime ticket, when those on an offpeak return are permitted to do so? If the Railcard is valid on trains where offpeak tickets are valid, then surely it is valid on those earlier trains. Logic suggests here that the restriction applies to the train, not starting point for the ticket.

 

[TonyR]

Consider getting a stack of Carnet tickets. They come in fives or tens, are valid for three months and work out cheaper than the same ticket on a Railcard. You can just keep a stack of them and anyone can pick up a ticket when they need one, date it and travel on it. Saves having to queue to buy a ticket too.


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[island]

There's a lot of trouble with carnets as they have to be dated clearly to be used, and it's hard to find a pen that will write on the ticket and easy to mess it up. Any ticket inspector sniffing even a hint of tickets being changed will kick up a huge fuss.

 

[TonyR]

There's a lot of trouble with carnets as they have to be dated clearly to be used, and it's hard to find a pen that will write on the ticket and easy to mess it up. Any ticket inspector sniffing even a hint of tickets being changed will kick up a huge fuss.

I just write it across the face of the ticket with a biro and have never had a problem in hundreds of uses. its virtually impossible to write in the allocated boxes.


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