Cheap Rail Tickets
This coming weekend I am heading up to Scotland for a friends wedding, not having an airport handy (what a world we live in - cheaper to fly than drive or train) I decided to investigate the trains.
The price of train tickets in the UK is ridiculous, often leaving people feeling like they’ve been mugged paying £83.00 for a day return Didcot Parkway - London (46 miles as the crow flies), without even guarantee of a seat!
On my journey from Bristol Temple Meads to Edinburgh the return ticket price was quoted as £132.00. One-hundred-and-thirty-two pounds!! A lot of money. In the end I only paid £41.00 by splitting the journey into multiple ‘Advance’ singles. Admittedly I did use a railcard, but even without one the ticket price would have been £62.00 - a saving of over £70!
Bristol - Birmingham, then Birmingham to Edinburgh cost me £10.25 each, the same with the return leg. It’s exactly the same train, just by splitting my journey into singles I saved £91.00!
How do you do it?
Use the National Rail website to look for your fares. Enter the details of your journey as you would normally (including the return information). When you’ve got the results hit the ‘Check Fares’ button, and look for options in the ‘Advance’ row under ‘Singles’. These are the fares you are interested in.
By clicking the ‘See All Details’ button (under the timetable) you can view information about the train services listed; who they are operated by, where the service runs from-to and what stops it will make. Take note of the ‘Retail Service ID’ - this is the ID of the train, and if possible you want to match your tickets so you are travelling on the same train (to save you changing).
Have a look at the stops listed and then try planning a new journey, but split it into two parts (in my example above I split Bristol - Edinburgh into Bristol - Birmingham then Birmingham - Edinburgh). When you come to look at the ’second leg’ of your journey, plan from the time your first train gets in - it may be you can stay on that train (check to see if the Retail Service ID’s match under ‘See Details’, and save money just by using two single tickets.
That’s it. I’m afraid there is an element of trial and error, but if you can spend 20 mins - an hour on it, you can make substantial savings. There are restrictions in place on advance tickets, but if you’ve saving almost a hundred quid a pop, I think they’re probably worth it.
