Ticket for Ealing Broadway to Reading via Paddington

[Smylers]

Hi there. Tomorrow evening I wish to travel from Ealing Broadway to Reading via Paddington. The ticket I've been issued says ‘Not London’. Is this ticket valid? If not, which ticket should I get?

The reason for this strange route is that I'm actually travelling from EAL to Didcot Parkway, for which the fastest journey for the time I've travelling is EAL–PAD (20:49–20:59) then PAD–DID (21:15–22:00). But I already have an unused return portion of a Slough–Leeds ticket; that will cover me RDG–DID, so it's only EAL–RDG which I need an additional ticket for.

EAL–RDG via PAD obviously involves doubling back (the PAD–RDG train will pass through EAL, though not stop at it), but the routeing guide has easement 40003 which says:

Customers travelling from Drayton Green, Castle Bar Park, South Greenford, Hanwell, West Ealing, Ealing Broadway and Acton Main Line to Hayes & Harlington and beyond may travel via Londonb [sic] Paddington.

I'm travelling from EAL and RDG is beyond HAY, so this easement applies. And since it's something I may do, there must be a ticket I can buy to do it.

I bought both tickets together from Leeds ticket office. The person serving me was aware of my route; she even issued a seat reservation for me for PAD–DID, which involves combining the two tickets. So I was rather surprised to spot just now that the EAL–RDG ticket says ‘Not London’.

Given that PAD is in London, that suggests the ticket isn't valid for my journey. But I can't find which ticket would be — the East Coast ticket site only offers 3 fares for EAL–RDG, all of which are ‘via: Via [sic] Not London’. I'm happy to pay more for an ‘any permitted’ ticket, if one exists.

If my ticket isn't valid for my journey, does the fact that I was issued it by a member of staff specifically to make that journey mean it has to be accepted?

Thanks for any advice.

 

[clagmonster]

The instructions for the routeing guide state:
"Where the fare specifies a
particular route, you may choose only those routes listed in the Guide which
pass through the station shown in the route description."
http://www.atoc.org/clientfiles/File/RSPDocuments/instructions.pdf page 2
As you point out, for these purposes London includes Paddington, so your ticket is not valid via Paddington.
All tickets for Ealing Broadway-Reading are route "not London", so although Paddington is on a permitted route no such tickets are valid there.
Castle Bar Park-Reading tickets are all routed "any permitted", so are valid via Paddington by this same easement. I would therefore advise you to purchase an over-distance excess for Castle Bar Park-Reading before boarding (any staffed booking office can do it, both today and tomorrow). This will cost £0.00 as the Castle Bar Park tickets are cheaper than those from Ealing Broadway. There is no restriction on break of journey so you are valid to start your journey at Ealing Broadway.

 

[Smylers]

your ticket is not valid via Paddington.

Hi there. Thanks for the speedy response.

All tickets for Ealing Broadway-Reading are route "not London", so although Paddington is on a permitted route no such tickets are valid there.

What's the point in the easement mentioning EAL then? It seems that it can never actually have any effect.

Also, that means that the Leeds ticket office sold me a ticket not valid for the journey I asked for; that doesn't seem right.

Castle Bar Park-Reading tickets are all routed "any permitted", so are valid via Paddington by this same easement. I would therefore advise you to purchase an over-distance excess for Castle Bar Park-Reading before boarding (any staffed booking office can do it, both today and tomorrow). This will cost £0.00 as the Castle Bar Park tickets are cheaper than those from Ealing Broadway.

Excellent, thank you.

Though: that's crazy! The only way to travel from CBP is through EAL, so having EAL tickets costing more and being more restrictive is nonsense, because in practice it doesn't restrict anything — it just penalizes those who haven't learnt about that particular quirk of the system.

I may as well see if I can get the EAL–RDG ticket refunded (I think that's possible with unused, still in-date, non-advance tickets) and then buy a CBP-RDG one. That'll save 70p.

(Moreover, it'll add to the general absurdity of the cheapest tickets for this trip being for places I'm not actually going it. My LDS–SLO return is for travelling LDS–HAY outbound then RDG–DID followed by OXF–LDS for the return leg. The only time I pass through SLO is on the PAD-RDG stage, on the other ticket — but LDS–HAY is only valid via London, so buying LDS–SLO is what lets me spend the weekend in Oxford on my way back.)

There is no restriction on break of journey so you are valid to start your journey at Ealing Broadway.

Good to know; I'd, erroneously, thought that only applied to return portions of tickets. Thank you again.

 

[transportphoto]

What I would do is buy a ticket from EAL to PAD (£3.10) then a ticket from PAD to RDG (£18.00) this will let you complete your reserved journey.

Then take the matter up with the TOC who run's Leeds Travel Centre (East Coast?) telling them what happened - explaining that you requested a ticket from EAL to RDG via PAD and which you were given reservations for although (unaware to you at the time) the ticket issued was invalid for that route; request a refund for the extra tickets you had to buy (£21.10).

I will quite happily draft up a complaint letter for you - if (once you have posted 5 times) you PM me the full details and the outlines of the conversation between you and the ticket seller at Leeds.

 

[A60K]

I've seen that easement before and it has to rank in the Top Ten of Stupid Easements. It allows to you travel from Hayes & Harlington to Hanwell via London Paddington. Compare the ticket prices from Hayes to Hanwell and Hayes to Paddington. Break of journey and starting/terminating short are allowed.

If you want to travel from Hayes to London which ticket are you gonna buy? Answers on a postcard to the Routeing Guide editor, and send a copy of it to FGW's pricing manager as well...

 

[Smylers]

Hmmm, I've made some progress, but after speaking to some staff I'm wondering how much of what they told me is correct, and for anything that isn't to whom I should address a complaint. And I'm still not sure what to do next.

I would therefore advise you to purchase an over-distance excess for Castle Bar Park-Reading before boarding (any staffed booking office can do it, both today and tomorrow).

I tried this, at Hayes & Harlington, but failed. The only member of staff there said it wasn't possible, seemingly because of:

This will cost £0.00 as the Castle Bar Park tickets are cheaper than those from Ealing Broadway.

He initially suggested that the system didn't provide a way for issuing tickets with zero cost. He then said the problem is because First Great Western would be giving me additional travel for which they don't get any money, and that I needed to buy the distance excess at Leeds. That way, he claimed, the train operating company at Leeds would pay First for the ticket issued and they would get money.

I may as well see if I can get the EAL–RDG ticket refunded (I think that's possible with unused, still in-date, non-advance tickets) and then buy a CBP-RDG one. That'll save 70p.

As an alternative, I asked for a refund for my unused ticket. Again the man at Hayes & Harlington declined to do this, claiming I could only get a refund at Leeds, because that's where I bought the ticket. When I queried that, saying I thought all stations dealt with tickets for all routes he said I was wrong, adding “they are all different train companies now”.

So next I decided to contact Network Rail, who run Leeds station and who sold me the duff ticket in the first place. Their contact page says to call National Rail Enquiries for matters relating to tickets and refunds, so I did.

The man in the call centre told me to apply to First Great Western for a refund for my ticket, who would charge an administration fee of £10. I protested it wasn't fair for me to pay this admin fee for being sold the wrong ticket. He said that they should have checked the ticket at the station. That's true, but it doesn't really help now. He put me on hold while he checked with his supervisor, then advised me to contact the company that sold me the ticket. I pointed out that that was Network Rail, who had told me to contact him.

I asked for an appropriate contact number for Network Rail. He gave me the number for Northern Rail, on the basis that they have more trains coming out of Leeds than anybody else. I'm struggling to see what my situation has to do with Northern Rail, so have yet to bother them.

I now have two alternative plans.

The conditions of carriage, section 1.13(e) says:

If you make your journey by a route other than those referred to in (a) and (b) above, you will be liable to pay an excess fare. This excess fare will be the difference between the price paid for the ticket you hold and the price of the lowest priced ticket(s) available for immediate travel that would have entitled you to travel by that route.

I think this is what applies if I set off from EAL tomorrow, and travel to PAD then RDG. So my first possible plan is to do that. The lowest price ticket I could have bought for immediate travel for that journey is, as clagmonster kindly pointed out before, CBP–RDG. So I'll owe them an excess fare of “the difference”, which is 70p. (This in itself seems crazy. The difference makes sense when the ticket I should've bought costs more than the one I did, but where I've already paid more than required making me pay the difference means I'll have doubled my overpayment!)

The other possibility is for me to buy a CBP–RDG ticket and use that tomorrow, then when I get back to Leeds claim a refund on the original ticket, which is permitted within 28 days, and ask for the administration fee to be waïved on the grounds that I was mis-sold.

The first plan involves intentionally travelling with a ticket I know to be invalid, which carries the risk that I haven't interpreted the rules correctly (or that a ticket inspector on one of the trains will disagree with my interpretation) and I have to pay an additional charge. And even if I've got everything correct, it'll cost me 70p.

The second plan should save me 70p (so ends up £1.40 cheaper than the first plan) but it involves an outlay of £11·70 and carries the risk that I don't actually succeed in persuading Leeds to give me a full refund.

Any preferences from the peanut gallery?

The lunacy didn't quite end there. Whichever of the above I'm do, I wanted to check what permits me to start a CBP journey at EAL, in case I need to discuss this with somebody on the barriers there. For Off-Peak Day Singles the First Great Western website says:

Break of journey is generally permitted unless prohibited for the journey that you are making. If you intend to break your journey, please contact us to check if it is permitted.

So I phoned them to check. For a ticket inquiry their phone system forwarded me to National Rail Enquiries, where I was asked to take an automated feedback survey after the call. I agreed, and punched in my phone number. Then I was put through to an operator (who did confirm the break of journey is allowed); as soon as this happened my phone rang. It was their automated survey, wanting feedback on how they dealt with my “recent” enquiry, which I'd've been happy to do if only they'd given me a chance to make it by then ...

 

[Greenback]

The man at Hayes & Harlington has given you some incorrect information. It's perfectly possible to a xero fare over distance excess, but as has been mentioen don this forum many times, some staff either don;t know how to do it, or don;t want to do it (it may well cause additional paperwork to account for the zero fare, which many TOC's see as giving away tickets).

It has nothing to do with allocation of revenue either. This is a smokescreen that is often used as an excuse for not doing something.

The man was correct to say that the refund could not be processed there and then. The refund form would have to be sent to Leeds, as the rules have always been that only the station that issued the ticket can refund it.

As for Network Rail and national Rail Enquiries, it has been well documented that they haven;t really got much of a clue about ticketing and routeing. In fairness to them, they are not generally involved with such niceities!

If I was you, I would go for plan A. I'm sure Leeds would dispute that the ticket was invalid, and you could end up in more of a mess trying to prove otherwise.

 

[323235]

As a side note Leeds ticket office is operated by Northern

 

[yorkie]

Smylers, you are a non-valued customer of an industry that wastes £billions of taxpayers money, run by companies that make a profit, and work in a way that treats the customer as being wrong unless it can be proven otherwise. You are an inconvenience to the running of the railway. Many wish excesses did not exist and will do anything to persuade you not to get one, as intelligence greater than that of an amoeba is required to issue one. This obviously presents problems for some. Do I expect a ticket clerk at a FGW suburban station to understand the ticketing system it is their job to understand? No, because I know that in the real world that doesn't happen. Do I expect them to give you correct information, and treat you as a customer? I wish I could say yes. But I cannot.

Basically you are entitled to a £0.00 excess and revenue allocations etc are utterly irrelevant. But it will cost you more money in terms of your time spent dealing with this, than any saving you could get by getting the excess. Also, any time saving going via Paddington will be wasted many times over by getting un-cooperative staff to issue the excess.

If you really need the excess, go to somewhere that has a clue. For example St Pancras, most EC stations (KGX was a problem but after uncooperative staff were reported to managers I'm told it's better now), and possibly Marylebone which is not too far from Paddington.

A few years ago there were some very good, co-operative people at Ealing Broadway. I didn't encounter them but I heard good reports, and people went out of their way to go there. They weren't particularly knowledgable but they did what was asked, and if they didn't know how to do something e.g. an excess, they would listen to instructions on what to press. I guess either they're not there any more, or you just got unlucky at that time.

As a side note Leeds ticket office is operated by Northern

Indeed. Network Rail don't deal with ticketing.

Northern at Leeds have not caused me any problems, I half expected them to refuse to issue a SOM-YRK ticket, but they issued it fine.

 

[Smylers]

The man at Hayes & Harlington has given you some incorrect information. It's perfectly possible to a xero fare over distance excess,

Thanks for confirming that. I might complain to First Great Western.

It has nothing to do with allocation of revenue either. This is a smokescreen that is often used as an excuse for not doing something.

Yeah, that didn't sound at all believable.

The man was correct to say that the refund could not be processed there and then. The refund form would have to be sent to Leeds, as the rules have always been that only the station that issued the ticket can refund it.

The conditions of carriage section 26 seems to apply here:

26. Refunds on tickets that have not been used.

If you decide not to use a ticket to make all or part of your intended journey, then:

(a) if the train you intended to use is cancelled ... <snip>

(b) if paragraph (a) does not apply and the ticket has been bought from a Train Company’s ticket office and you return your ticket at any Train Company’s ticket office no later than 28 days after the expiry of the ticket’s validity, you will receive a refund

That seems pretty clear that any ticket office should issue the refund. What makes you think different?

As for Network Rail and national Rail Enquiries, it has been well documented that they haven;t really got much of a clue about ticketing and routeing. In fairness to them, they are not generally involved with such niceities!

Well Network Rail are responsible for Leeds station, where I bought the ticket, and National Rail Enquiries are who First Great Western have outsourced their routeing enquiries to, so they really should know.

If I was you, I would go for plan A. I'm sure Leeds would dispute that the ticket was invalid, and you could end up in more of a mess trying to prove otherwise.

Thanks.

Do I expect a ticket clerk at a FGW suburban station to understand the ticketing system it is their job to understand? No, because I know that in the real world that doesn't happen.

I didn't really expect it either. That's one of the reasons I took a print-out of clagmonster's advice with me, but even showing the bit about a zero-fare distance excess to the man at the counter had no effect.

Basically you are entitled to a £0.00 excess and revenue allocations etc are utterly irrelevant. But it will cost you more money in terms of your time spent dealing with this, than any saving you could get by getting the excess.

Yeah, it seems so.

Also, any time saving going via Paddington will be wasted many times over by getting un-cooperative staff to issue the excess.

There's a slight difference in that tomorrow evening I have an event in Ealing and one in Oxford with little time between them, so really do need to minimize the travelling time then. That's why I was prepared to spend half an hour this evening, when I had some spare time, going out of my way to walk to Hayes & Harlington station.

Also, my girlfriend is expecting to meet me at PAD to travel to DID together, since that's what we planned, so regardless of what route I should've picked in the first place by now I definitely will be travelling via PAD.

If you really need the excess, go to somewhere that has a clue. For example St Pancras, most EC stations (KGX was a problem but after uncooperative staff were reported to managers I'm told it's better now), and possibly Marylebone which is not too far from Paddington.

But I'm in Hayes right now. Going anywhere else will involve buying another ticket to get to a different ticket office, which is definitely more expensive.

As a side note Leeds ticket office is operated by Northern

Indeed. Network Rail don't deal with ticketing.

Network Rail's website claims that they run Leeds station. I can't see mention that they've outsourced the ticket office to Northern, but even if that's the case they should still have responsibility for what happens there. And indeed for the phone operators they tell me to call knowing who it is that runs their ticket office. Bah.

 

[MikeWh]

... the ticket has been bought from a Train Company’s ticket office and you return your ticket at any Train Company’s ticket office no later than 28 days ...

It depends what any refers to. I think it means any ticket office operated by the single company that you bought the ticket from.

 

[Greenback]

The rule you refer to simply means that you can hand the ticket in to any ticket office. It will then be forwarded to the station/TOC that issued the ticket. You will have to complete a refund application, and you will get a copy of the form for your records.

The only time a refund can be done there and then is if you have bought it there and, within a short time (though how long is not set in stone), you decide not to travel because of a delayed or cancelled train. (Notice how the rule doesn't say an immediate refund, or mention an administration fee, another example of the lack of clarity in railway ticketing and rules!)

Network Rail are not responsible for the ticket office in Leeds, as Yorkie has already mentioned. The station is managed by NR, but ticket facilities are provided by Northern, much like FGW at the NR operated Paddington. There is no outsourcing, it's how the different parts of BR were split up under privatisation!

In regard to the routeing, I doubt there are very many people in FGW who understand the routeing guide. I wouldn;t expect any of their front line staff to have amuch real knowledge of it's workings. I worked in Reading ticket office for several years, and, fortunately, no one ever made a routeing enquiry when I was on my duty. I would have struggled with it, and none of my colleagues knew any more about it than I did! And thinks were less complicated in those days (10 years ago nearly).

 

[transportphoto]

Network Rail's website claims that they run Leeds station. I can't see mention that they've outsourced the ticket office to Northern, but even if that's the case they should still have responsibility for what happens there. And indeed for the phone operators they tell me to call knowing who it is that runs their ticket office. Bah.

No - NR only run the station, not the Travel Centre / Ticket Office - for example Birmingham New Street, managed by NR but the Ticket Office / Travel Centre is Heavily Virgin Trains branded as they run the ticket buying facilities at that station.

I agree that Leeds isn't TOC branded but the staff selling the tickets wear Northern Uniforms.

-------------

As you now need to travel via PAD then I would either recommend the demanding excess or the new tickets as detailed by me earlier this thread.

------------

However I have just looked into the NRCoC - Section I - D:

21. Buying Tickets
As soon as you can, you should check that the details shown on the ticket are
consistent with the journey you intend to make and that you have received the
correct change. If you think a mistake has been made you should tell the person who sold
you the ticket.

I know that you asked for a ticket for EAL to RDG via PAD for 02 July, but the tickets issued were routed "Not London" - it was your responsibility to check the tickets before you left the counter (I understand that you assumed the tickets were valid for the journey you asked for - because you would automatically do so) so any complaint made this could be held against you and any refund given would be as a good will gesture.

 

[Greenback]

I know that you asked for a ticket for EAL to RDG via PAD for 02 July, but the tickets issued were routed "Not London" - it was your responsibility to check the tickets before you left the counter (I understand that you assumed the tickets were valid for the journey you asked for - because you would automatically do so) so any complaint made this could be held against you and any refund given would be as a good will gesture.

That's the problem the OP might have in asking for a refund without the admin fee taken off. How can they prove that they asked for it to be via Paddington? And also, if the staff at Leeds are adamant that the easement allows the ticket to be valid? It's not worht the hassle really.

 

[clagmonster]

A seat reservation from Paddington was provided at the same time, it will be possible to identify the machine the reservation was issued from and also the time of issue from that, thus proving the ticket was issued for travel via Paddington, even so this is not valid.

 

[Greenback]

Yes, that's true, but what about the easement? What's to stop them hding behind that, and telling the OP to take it up with FGW?

I'd still rather travel using the tickets and itinerary provided by Leeds than buy a completely new ticket and embroil myself in the refund procedure!