Chester - Crewe

[parkender102]

Daughter has a cheap ticket back to London this Friday on the slow West Midlands Trains service 16:33 Crewe - London Euston. So she was going to just purchase a Single (with Railcard) from Chester to Crewe to connect with that service - ideally the 15:35 from Chester. All fares are shown as £9.20 Anytime Day Single with Railcard Discount on National Rail - apart from the 15:35! The 15:35 is the Avanti Service to London Euston stopping at Crewe and the only Fares shown are Off Peak Day Ranger £17.70 or 1st Class Anytime 21:00. This can't be right surely!

 

[jfollows]

Daughter has a cheap ticket back to London this Friday on the slow West Midlands Trains service 16:33 Crewe - London Euston. So she was going to just purchase a Single (with Railcard) from Chester to Crewe to connect with that service - ideally the 15:35 from Chester. All fares are shown as £9.20 Anytime Day Single with Railcard Discount on National Rail - apart from the 15:35! The 15:35 is the Avanti Service to London Euston stopping at Crewe and the only Fares shown are Off Peak Day Ranger £17.70 or 1st Class Anytime 21:00. This can't be right surely!

It's presumably related to Avanti making all their services "reservation compulsory" still. Buy the ticket and get on the train and it'll be fine.
Although maybe that's not the reason if the first class Anytime is showing up! But it could be because all the "reservable" seats are showing as reserved, after all it's a Friday afternoon.

Note that for this specific train it's made of two portions, one from Holyhead and the other from Crewe which arrives at 15:08 before joining to the portion from Holyhead when it arrives at 15:28.

 

[parkender102]

Just tried it on another couple of Train Booking Sites - Trainline, West Midlands and ATW - all saying Standard Not Available! I suppose an Anytime Day Single (Standard) is valid on any Chester - Crewe Service (I've been doing it for years and never known an Off Peak Return not to be valid). It just seems they are not selling for this particular service. So just purchase an Anytime Day Single beforehand and get on the train - wondering whether the TVM will prevent this happening around the time of departure?

 

[nedchester]

Get a Chester to Shrewsbury single (valid via Crewe) and much cheaper

 

[507020]

Get a Chester to Shrewsbury single (valid via Crewe) and much cheaper

Chester - Crewe is massively overpriced. Chester - Stoke-on-Trent is also much cheaper, despite being a longer journey and using multiple operators…

 

[MrTrainRider]

Chester - Crewe is massively overpriced. Chester - Stoke-on-Trent is also much cheaper, despite being a longer journey and using multiple operators…

Had my hopes up for this tip but from what I can see an off peak return from Chester to Stoke (via Crewe) is now £19.60? Any other tips or tricks to get from Chester to Crewe would be welcome, I can't believe how expensive the Chester to Crewe service is!

 

[MrTrainRider]

I regularly travel between Chester and London. More often than not I take advantage of the fantastic super off peak return tickets from Crewe to Euston, begrudgingly however this also involves purchasing an extortionately priced ticket for the short journey between Chester and Crewe.

I believe it used to be possible to purchase much cheaper tickets for journeys that change at Crewe (e.g. Chester to Stoke and Chester to Shrewsbury) and then make the connection at Crewe this way, however these tickets are now a comparable price to the Chester to Crewe tickets. Does anyone have a solution? ...I'm half tempted to catch a bus next time!

 

[Jurg]

I regularly travel between Chester and London. More often than not I take advantage of the fantastic super off peak return tickets from Crewe to Euston, begrudgingly however this also involves purchasing an extortionately priced ticket for the short journey between Chester and Crewe.

I believe it used to be possible to purchase much cheaper tickets for journeys that change at Crewe (e.g. Chester to Stoke and Chester to Shrewsbury) and then make the connection at Crewe this way, however these tickets are now a comparable price to the Chester to Crewe tickets. Does anyone have a solution? ...I'm half tempted to catch a bus next time!

If you're getting the LNR train from Euston to Crewe, there may be a split that includes the great value CDR fare between Nuneaton and Chester. Maybe split:

Euston - Milton Keynes,
Milton Keynes - Nuneaton,
Nuneaton - Chester

 

[Jurg]

Edit: wrong thread

 

[Watershed]

I regularly travel between Chester and London. More often than not I take advantage of the fantastic super off peak return tickets from Crewe to Euston, begrudgingly however this also involves purchasing an extortionately priced ticket for the short journey between Chester and Crewe.

I believe it used to be possible to purchase much cheaper tickets for journeys that change at Crewe (e.g. Chester to Stoke and Chester to Shrewsbury) and then make the connection at Crewe this way, however these tickets are now a comparable price to the Chester to Crewe tickets. Does anyone have a solution? ...I'm half tempted to catch a bus next time!

Unfortunately Chester to Crewe is a bit of a 'ransom strip'. In fact anything west or south-east of Chester is expensive. I suppose for Chester-Crewe the logic is that the train is a lot quicker than driving over the poor local roads - but that naturally falls apart as soon as your journey becomes anything other than station to station.

Chester to Alsager is ever so slightly cheaper than Chester to Crewe (£13.50 for an Anytime Day Return), and there's an Off-Peak Day Return for £13.20, which is valid from 08:30 onwards. And if you actually travel via Alsager (as opposed to just using that ticket to get to Crewe), there's an additional saving to be had, as Alsager to London LNR only fares are slightly cheaper than those from Crewe.

Of course there is a time penalty as you have to change twice, at Crewe as well as Stafford. But your total would be £45.20 from Chester - a few quid cheaper overall.

Unfortunately, with the way that the LNR only fares are priced, unfortunately the splits suggested by @Jurg above are unlikely to save you anything - despite the good value of the Nuneaton-Chester CDR.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

It's curious that there isn't a Chester-Euston through fare valid on TfW/LNR, ie a "not Avanti" option.
There is a Chester-Marylebone on TfW/LNR/CH, but that's via Birmingham.
The same could be said for Manchester-Euston on Northern (or TfW)/LNR.

Having recently done Flint-Manchester Airport, I was baffled to find the fare was considerably cheaper than Chester-Airport (same trains, conditions and fare setter-TfW).

 

[jamiearmley]

Had my hopes up for this tip but from what I can see an off peak return from Chester to Stoke (via Crewe) is now £19.60? Any other tips or tricks to get from Chester to Crewe would be welcome, I can't believe how expensive the Chester to Crewe service is!

I would just buy the anytime day single at £14/ £9.20 with railcard Chester to crewe. Doesn't matter which service you 'buy it for', its an Anytime single, so valid on all services between Chester and crewe. As others have said, this is a result of Avanti having a reservation system in place on online booking systems. It bears no relation to anything in reality. You will be able to board the 15:35, as indeed you will be able to board any train between Chester and crewe that day.

Worth noting that Avanti is currently in meltdown, and as such there exists a 'schrodinger's cat' situation, in that the existence or otherwise of the 15:35 will not be proven until it appears on the platform.
Good luck!

 

[AM9]

I would just buy the anytime day single at £14/ £9.20 with railcard Chester to crewe. Doesn't matter which service you 'buy it for', its an Anytime single, so valid on all services between Chester and crewe. As others have said, this is a result of Avanti having a reservation system in place on online booking systems. It bears no relation to anything in reality. You will be able to board the 15:35, as indeed you will be able to board any train between Chester and crewe that day.

Worth noting that Avanti is currently in meltdown, and as such there exists a 'schrodinger's cat' situation, in that the existence or otherwise of the 15:35 will not be proven until it appears on the platform.
Good luck!

Surely a Schrodinger's cat similarity would be if the a train was standing at the platform ready to go but the PIS said that it had been cancelled!

 

[jamiearmley]

Surely a Schrodinger's cat similarity would be if the a train was standing at the platform ready to go but the PIS said that it had been cancelled!

Absolutely! Sadly, there are many daily examples of this ....

 

[MrTrainRider]

Thank you for the advice, even if it doesn't provide the answers I'd like to hear. Am I right in thinking that a TfW/LNR service will soon be running between Euston and Chester? Or is this just wishful thinking? The Avanti service for the same route is very expensive and very unreliable but I suppose that goes without saying.

 

[JonathanH]

Am I right in thinking that a TfW/LNR service will soon be running between Euston and Chester? Or is this just wishful thinking?

Wishful thinking.

 

[Watershed]

Thank you for the advice, even if it doesn't provide the answers I'd like to hear. Am I right in thinking that a TfW/LNR service will soon be running between Euston and Chester? Or is this just wishful thinking? The Avanti service for the same route is very expensive and very unreliable but I suppose that goes without saying.

There's no chance of a through service competing with Avanti - the line from Crewe to Chester is unelectrified and LNR's paths on the Fast Lines only work with their 110mph 350s. If anything, the only extension I could feasibly see happening would be to Liverpool, or possibly Manchester Airport. But both of those would be fanciful in the current cost-constrained environment.

Another option, again slower than just your single change at Crewe, would be to go via Runcorn. You'd use the cheap TfW only £6.20 Chester-Runcorn CDR and then an LNR only fare from there to London, £38 for the Super Off-Peak Return. So a total of £44.20. Unfortunately the connections at Runcorn aren't great and TfW is only running their Chester-Liverpool service every two hours at the moment.

A second option would be to buy a Merseyrail Day Saver for £5.60 to get to Liverpool. And then again it's £38 for the LNR only Super Off-Peak Return to London, so marginally cheaper at £43.60. (You could alternatively use a Saveaway which would also give you bus and ferry validity for an extra 5p.)

And third option would be to buy a Chester-Shrewsbury Off-Peak Day Return (£12) and then a Shrewsbury-London TfW & LNR only Super Off-Peak Return (£28.50). This would make for a total of £40.50 but with the various time restrictions, it's virtually impossible to make day trip using these tickets.