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Interrail - leaving uk

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soup6

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14 Jul 2011
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28
Is it permissible for a UK resident to use the "outbound from home country" leg of an Interrail pass to travel to Thurso en route for Kirkwall (Orkney Islands) airport and a flight to Bergen in Norway when these are running? I assume that Inverness airport (also for Bergen) is unconroversial.

(Mods) please move to Fares if appropriate.
 
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RailUK Forums

ivorytoast28

ivorytoast28

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The outbound journey has no restrictions, you can make any journey within the uk on that day, and also on the inbound. You can make multiple journeys, you don't even have to be going to an airport/port/eurostar
 
mad_rich

mad_rich

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The T&Cs are here, page 22.
5.2 Travel in Country of Residence with an Interrail Pass
The Interrail Pass has a specific convenient price which assumes that you are traveling abroad to experience Europe. Therefore the product cannot be used extensively in your country of residence since the pricing for such a usage, in some countries, would be higher. In case of extensive misuse, the railways would decide to increase globally the price of the product which would be unfair towards the travellers who really want to experience Europe. In case a ticket inspector observes misuse of this condition, e.g. in case of frequent travels from and to the same destination, he/she can issue a fine and ask for blocking of the Pass to limit further usage.
An Interrail Global Pass and an Interrail France Germany Pass, may only be used for two specific trips in the country of residence of the traveller (provided this country is an Interrail participating country). These two trips are referred to as the outbound and inbound journey.
  • The outbound journey can be used to travel from any location in the country of residence to the border or an airport or port.
  • The inbound journey can be used to travel from the border or an airport or port back to any location in the country of residence.
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It's fine to use it for a journey to an airport.

It's not fine to use it for jollying around the country without going to a port/ airport/ St Pancras. The app will let you do that, and a ticket inspector probably won't look too closely, but he's within his rights to ask to see your international ticket, and so would Eurail. It's also clearly outside the spirit of Interrail and could result in unfavourable changes in the future if there's too much of it.
 
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rvdborgt

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mad_rich said:
It's not fine to use it for jollying around the country without going to a port/ airport/ St Pancras. The app will let you do that, and a ticket inspector probably won't look too closely, but he's within his rights to ask to see your international ticket, and so would Eurail. It's also clearly outside the spirit of Interrail and could result in unfavourable changes in the future if there's too much of it.
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You have to travel to/from a border, port or airport, but there is no requirement whatsoever to do that via the shortest or fastest route.
 
30907

30907

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Correct. I agree with the OP - Inverness is reasonable (for any international flight - you don't even have to use it) but Thurso for Scrabster for Kirkwall for Bergen is pushing it.
And coming back from either might be more "interesting" unless you've used an intermediate day on the mainland.
 
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StephenHunter

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I used my outbound journey last year to get me to Heathrow to fly to Warsaw. It's valid on the Elizabeth Line.
 
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800001

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Is this rule only applicable to Global pass and French/German Interrail?
 
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rvdborgt

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One country passes don't have in/outbound journeys because they're only valid in the country mentioned on the pass.
 
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peteb

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In many ways we, in the UK, are lucky we can use the inter-rail global pass to get to the continent. I imagine the one journey outward and inbound rule of the global pass makes life difficult for those in, say, Germany to roam Europe in any random way.

By that I mean you can't leave Germany and travel around southern Europe then go back through Germany to travel to Scandinavia, except by buying additional tickets.
 
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RT4038

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22 Feb 2014
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peteb said:
In many ways we, in the UK, are lucky we can use the inter-rail global pass to get to the continent. I imagine the one journey outward and inbound rule of the global pass makes life difficult for those in, say, Germany to roam Europe in any random way.

By that I mean you can't leave Germany and travel around southern Europe then go back through Germany to travel to Scandinavia, except by buying additional tickets.
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Also France, if they want to visit Spain/Portugal and then somewhere else, or the UK/Ireland and then somewhere else [suppose would get away with going London-Brussels]
 
Gaelan

Gaelan

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rvdborgt said:
One country passes don't have in/outbound journeys because they're only valid in the country mentioned on the pass.
Click to expand...
(Exception: the Benelux pass isn’t valid in the home country of a Benelux resident. Not sure off hand if they get inbound/outbound journeys.)
 
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Cloud Strife

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soup6 said:
Is it permissible for a UK resident to use the "outbound from home country" leg of an Interrail pass to travel to Thurso en route for Kirkwall (Orkney Islands) airport and a flight to Bergen in Norway when these are running? I assume that Inverness airport (also for Bergen) is unconroversial.

(Mods) please move to Fares if appropriate.
Click to expand...

Can't see any issue with it. Sumburgh is an international airport, it has a direct connection to Bergen, so why not?
 
KnobbyGB

KnobbyGB

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peteb said:
In many ways we, in the UK, are lucky we can use the inter-rail global pass to get to the continent. I imagine the one journey outward and inbound rule of the global pass makes life difficult for those in, say, Germany to roam Europe in any random way.

By that I mean you can't leave Germany and travel around southern Europe then go back through Germany to travel to Scandinavia, except by buying additional tickets.
Click to expand...
Technically you CAN. The "inbound" journey doesn't have to be on the last day of your pass - it can be in the middle. Maybe you want to go home for a few days and continue travelling. So you could use your inbound day to travel back across Germany to Scandinavia. You just have to remember that then you CAN'T use it again to get back home - but maybe you'll fly home or something.
 
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peteb

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30 Mar 2011
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KnobbyGB said:
Technically you CAN. The "inbound" journey doesn't have to be on the last day of your pass - it can be in the middle. Maybe you want to go home for a few days and continue travelling. So you could use your inbound day to travel back across Germany to Scandinavia. You just have to remember that then you CAN'T use it again to get back home - but maybe you'll fly home or something.
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Yes, I've often combined a global interrail pass with cheap flights to/from the UK or even within Europe, mainly to save time rather than interrail "days".
 
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