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The Train Line
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No idea, but I consider the irony of calling people who buy at the ticket office "sheep" very amusing, given all theTrainline's customers are also sheep for being taken in by their marketing, as they could get their tickets elsewhere cheaper in virtually all cases.
In fact, if I bought my Advance ticket in advance at a ticket office I would be paying LESS than a customer of theTrainline buying the ticket at the same time. Who's the sheep now?
In fact, if I bought my Advance ticket in advance at a ticket office I would be paying LESS than a customer of theTrainline buying the ticket at the same time. Who's the sheep now?
moonrakerz
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Failed Unit
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That is my understanding - but it is the walk-on fare at the time rather than the open. So they could be comparing a super off-peak with the cheapest AP.
I wonder how many times people buy a more expensive combo of APs than the walk-on. It is easily done especially if you book your outward and return on different dates because of when bookings open.
Polarbear
Established Member
Wooly advertising by the Trainline...??
...coat...!!
This is how:
http://www.thetrainline.com/advertising-campaigns/index.shtml#a1
I assume then it is more expensive to buy at the station than it is online as I don't think these discounted tickets are available at the station. :roll:
http://www.thetrainline.com/advertising-campaigns/index.shtml#a1
I assume then it is more expensive to buy at the station than it is online as I don't think these discounted tickets are available at the station. :roll:
Yes, but if we look at the big picture, on-line purchasing of tickets has been an enormous benefit to passengers and TOCs. Passengers can spend time in their own home, looking at the alternatives, and coming up with the tickets that best suit their needs and budget. TOCs can optimise loadings and get their money sooner. Queues are reduced at tickets offices, benefiting everyone. I am sure that much of the growth in recent years is down to people being able to plan journeys and buy tickets from home.
Yes, online purchasing is great, but not at the trainline. You will pretty much always pay more for tickets on that site than you will on the TOCs own websites, sometimes significantly more if they are offering additional discounts on their own services (eg East Coast offer 10% off their own fares).
David
Established Member
Wooly advertising by the Trainline...??
...coat...!!
Ewe must be joking! :P
Oh, when ordering through thetrainline, don't forget to add on either £1.50 or £2 (depending on how you collect your tickets) to the actual cost of the ticket(s).
MidnightFlyer
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I will admit to telling people on other (non-rail related) forums to avoid the TTL, and use TOC or booking offices instead. I think a recent survey last year showed that 70% of people (or something close to that) preferred buying via staff than online...
Out of curiosity, what is the station featured on the advert, it doesn't look very British (the stock definitely ain't), I originally thought Nottingham for the concourse, but I swear one of the departure board reads 'Edinburgh'!
Out of curiosity, what is the station featured on the advert, it doesn't look very British (the stock definitely ain't), I originally thought Nottingham for the concourse, but I swear one of the departure board reads 'Edinburgh'!
It is a good thing, BUT theTrainline charge more in all cases and you are always better off buying from either the ticket office, or the website of a Toc.
Similarly, Red Spotted Hanky give points, but with their minimum additional charge £1, you'd have to spend £100 per transaction to even match the price of the Tocs websites or the ticket office! http://www.railforums.co.uk/showthread.php?t=34648
Transpennine Express also offer cashback through certain websites and also through employee discount websites also. The amount is marginal (the employee discount website I use offers 1.5% as cashback, and a bonus for TPx tickets, but you might get better elsewhere).
There are other deals out there; East Coast 10% off, EMT £1 off, XC Student discount, TPx Student discount, etc., etc. which you can't get on theTrainline
I read somewhere (maybe on here!) that it was filmed in Wellington, New Zealand!
Pass...But I've seen people who've bought two Singles from TTL that cost more than the equivalent Return more times than I care to remember.
Super Off-Peak Single London - Birmingham: £19.40
Super Off-Peak Single Birmingham - London: £19.40
Total: £38.80
Super Off-Peak Return London - Birmingham: £19.50
Silly ewe paid 99% more than someone who bought their ticket at the station.
Cheers,
Barry
So really the only useful information that we get from this advert is that advance tickets are on average about 43% cheaper than walk-on fares?
Pausing it on 13 seconds and the trains are going to 'Birmingham', 'Manchester', 'London', 'Glasgow', 'Edinburgh' and 'Leicester'. Given that many of them aren't real destinations anyway (don't boards always display the specific station for London/Manchester/Birmingham/Glasgow at least?), and the London train seems to be an NXEA service (it has the most easy to read stops: Norwich, Ipswich, Colchester, etc) I'd suggest that it's not a real departure board!
Pausing it on 13 seconds and the trains are going to 'Birmingham', 'Manchester', 'London', 'Glasgow', 'Edinburgh' and 'Leicester'. Given that many of them aren't real destinations anyway (don't boards always display the specific station for London/Manchester/Birmingham/Glasgow at least?), and the London train seems to be an NXEA service (it has the most easy to read stops: Norwich, Ipswich, Colchester, etc) I'd suggest that it's not a real departure board!
Chapeltom
Established Member
To the people in the know, the TrainLine are a rip off and their advertising is enough to entice people (sheep) (who don't know about their booking fees) to buy from them. TOC websites usually offer good deals, when buying online for a longer journey I'll first look the national rail website and the TOC I'm travelling with if I'm not satisfied with the results on NRE. People sadly won't do that, it can take just 5 minutes of searching to avoid being swindled. The First TransPennine Express student promotion is something that isn't advertised well enough in my opnion but the offer is very good and I'm got some cheap tickets at only 2-4 weeks notice off there, two 160 mile round-trips for like £8!
The public sadly have very bad misconceptions about trains in this country, people thinking its cheaper to buy in advance for walk-on tickets! It's a shame a lot of people are quite ignorant and won't listen to advice from people who know what they are talking about.
The public sadly have very bad misconceptions about trains in this country, people thinking its cheaper to buy in advance for walk-on tickets! It's a shame a lot of people are quite ignorant and won't listen to advice from people who know what they are talking about.
NSE
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Mind you, if you book early in advance you do get great discounts from the Trainline. I'm going Bedford-St. Pancras-Euston-Stafford. And the Euston to Stafford was £3.60 each way. I went First Class on all but the first leg, and its £49 in total, when that should have been £252 for the First Class seats if I walked up to the desk and asked for that. So it is good value in some cases 
Mind you, if you book early in advance you do get great discounts from the Trainline. I'm going Bedford-St. Pancras-Euston-Stafford. And the Euston to Stafford was £3.60 each way. I went First Class on all but the first leg, and its £49 in total, when that should have been £252 for the First Class seats if I walked up to the desk and asked for that. So it is good value in some cases
But you can book advance on the train company's website and not get charged a booking fee.
NSE
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Was there a special offer on then? 'This month only no booking fee' or something similar?
Well, the booking fee was only £1 for the whole transaction. So really it only cost me £48
Yes, but you could have got the same deal for £48 by going to the station (not really practicable most cases though I knw!) or by booking at the relevant TOC website.
It's the assertion that The Trainline is the cheapest way to book any tickets, when it clearly isn't because of the various additional charges added, that irritates myself and others!
It's the assertion that The Trainline is the cheapest way to book any tickets, when it clearly isn't because of the various additional charges added, that irritates myself and others!
Does the Trainline actually do any special deals though? To me, it's just a search engine that shows you all of the tickets you can get anywhere else - and then adds on a booking fee!
The East Coast site seems easier to use (although, it's quite complex and can be slow on some machines/Internet connections) although a colleague here did say the fares were more expensive than Trainline until I realised he'd clicked on '1st' by mistake (it's quite small on the buttons)!
I doubt for one millisecond that Trainline randomly compared some fares. They probably spent some considerable time finding the best examples to show the savings - which are only savings on full price tickets, not savings on what you can get anywhere else! Surely that's false advertising? I think 99% of the public think that Trainline offers tickets that normally cost £x for £y, when they're actually totally different tickets.
The East Coast site seems easier to use (although, it's quite complex and can be slow on some machines/Internet connections) although a colleague here did say the fares were more expensive than Trainline until I realised he'd clicked on '1st' by mistake (it's quite small on the buttons)!
I doubt for one millisecond that Trainline randomly compared some fares. They probably spent some considerable time finding the best examples to show the savings - which are only savings on full price tickets, not savings on what you can get anywhere else! Surely that's false advertising? I think 99% of the public think that Trainline offers tickets that normally cost £x for £y, when they're actually totally different tickets.
I don't think the Trainline can do any deals, it can't cut fares because it doesn;t set any, and its profits are based on the small amount of commission it receives plus any profit it can make form the charges.
In contrast, East Coast will receive all of the revenue from its own advance tickets, and so cna afford to offer additional discounts on those tickets.
I don;t really know what the gerneral public thinks about it. Judging from people I;ve spoken to, manuy think it is some sort of magic site that automatically finds you cheapest possible tickets that can't be obtained anywhere else. Such is the power of their advertising I suppose!
I believe a complaint about their advertising failed at the ASA, though I can't begin to fathom on what grounds!
In contrast, East Coast will receive all of the revenue from its own advance tickets, and so cna afford to offer additional discounts on those tickets.
I don;t really know what the gerneral public thinks about it. Judging from people I;ve spoken to, manuy think it is some sort of magic site that automatically finds you cheapest possible tickets that can't be obtained anywhere else. Such is the power of their advertising I suppose!
I believe a complaint about their advertising failed at the ASA, though I can't begin to fathom on what grounds!
The wording in the advert would be enough to get round the ASA I'd have thought: it says that "Are you still paying full price for your train ticket on the day? People buying Advanced fare tickets at the trainline.com saved an average of 43%", whilst the small print on the screen says "Savings available on Advanced fares only. Advanced fares not available on every route."
All of this is, I think, true. They don't mention that you could save slightly more elsewhere, or by buying at the station in advance, but then its not their job to advertise other people's products!
Without wishing to have a go at NSE directly, you can see the scale of the problem when a member on here for over 10 months still thinks he's got a good deal from them and isn't even fussed about the booking fee.
The ASA must employ sheep too.
All they can do, and all they DO, is offer their own way of searching for all the tickets that are out there and obtainable by anyone in a variety of ways.
Thus, they can't save you any money at all!
They should sell themselves on convenience, and on how easy it is (if it is) to do a search to ensure you will find the right ticket for you. They can't sell on price as all the prices are fixed.
Ah, if that's what they say then it's totally correct and above board - and relying on the public misinterpreting the ad. Clever, but also totally underhand!
Apologies to the ASA, who are probably unable to do anything in these cases.
All they can do, and all they DO, is offer their own way of searching for all the tickets that are out there and obtainable by anyone in a variety of ways.
Thus, they can't save you any money at all!
They should sell themselves on convenience, and on how easy it is (if it is) to do a search to ensure you will find the right ticket for you. They can't sell on price as all the prices are fixed.
Ah, if that's what they say then it's totally correct and above board - and relying on the public misinterpreting the ad. Clever, but also totally underhand!
Apologies to the ASA, who are probably unable to do anything in these cases.
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Argh! No, you didn't get a good deal by booking on theTrainline, you paid more than you would have done elsewhere.Mind you, if you book early in advance you do get great discounts from the Trainline. I'm going Bedford-St. Pancras-Euston-Stafford. And the Euston to Stafford was £3.60 each way. I went First Class on all but the first leg, and its £49 in total, when that should have been £252 for the First Class seats if I walked up to the desk and asked for that. So it is good value in some cases
I think he did get good value, but probably not the very best deal. It's a bit like buying a tin of beans in Tesco rather than Lidl - it's still probably cheaper than Waitrose.
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