Northern Ireland iLink cards

[Atlantean114]

Does anyone on here have a good understanding of the Northern Ireland iLink cards please? I shall be visiting NI for 5 days in the coming weeks. On the Monday and Friday I will need a 3 zone ticket in order to get from and to Belfast International Airport. On the days in between, I will require all zones (Zone 4) on one day but on the other two, only 1 or maybe 2 zones will be required. Can I top up the same card with different zones for different days or is each card only available for one particular zone?

Any advice that you can give me would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.

 

[Dave91131]

I'm due to visit NI in the next few weeks too, for 4 days.

I've purchased, and received, a "zone 4 + north west" iLink card, which cost £60 and is valid for 7 days.

I won't need every zone every day, but from what I read before purchasing it seemed the simplest and most cost effective ticket to purchase.

I think, but am not certain, that the 3 days unused validity I'll have after my visit can be used on a future visit.

Hope this helps.

 

[Steddenm]

Does anyone on here have a good understanding of the Northern Ireland iLink cards please? I shall be visiting NI for 5 days in the coming weeks. On the Monday and Friday I will need a 3 zone ticket in order to get from and to Belfast International Airport. On the days in between, I will require all zones (Zone 4) on one day but on the other two, only 1 or maybe 2 zones will be required. Can I top up the same card with different zones for different days or is each card only available for one particular zone?

Any advice that you can give me would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you.

I am sure that with iLink you can add whatever smart zone tickets you want to on any given day. You don't have to have a specific card for each zone you travel into.

Y.ou can contact the Visit Belfast team on 028 9024 6609 who are very knowledgeable (ask for the Translink desk) or Translink directly on 028 9066 6630.

There is an iLink website at https://www.translink.co.uk/usingtranslink/ticketsandtravelcards/ilink

At certain rail stations (Yorkgate, Lanyon Place, Great Victoria Street, Botanic, Lisburn, et al) you have to activate your iLink card using the reader by the ticket gate before and after travelling. Other stations you just tap it on the guards ticket machine.

It's important to note that the card cannot hold more than one ticket at a time - but can be topped up at rail stations, on Metro or Ulsterbus services (not Goldline), from the station or train guard, at some PayPoint shops (not all) as well as on Glider ticket machines.

I'm due to visit NI in the next few weeks too, for 4 days.

I've purchased, and received, a "zone 4 + north west" iLink card, which cost £60 and is valid for 7 days.

I won't need every zone every day, but from what I read before purchasing it seemed the simplest and most cost effective ticket to purchase.

I think, but am not certain, that the 3 days unused validity I'll have after my visit can be used on a future visit.

Hope this helps.

Unfortunately not. Only daily tickets are valid for 12 months if they are not activated.

A weekly ticket expires exactly a week after you first activate it.

 

[zero]

I am sure that with iLink you can add whatever smart zone tickets you want to on any given day. You don't have to have a specific card for each zone you travel into.

Not according to this post https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/ilink-and-enterprise.219813/#post-5739122

 

[Steddenm]

Not according to this post https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/ilink-and-enterprise.219813/#post-5739122

You can put iLink day tickets onto na DayLink card which don't show any zones at all. The newer iLink cards which are slowly being phased in (I've only seen them at Eurospar next to Botanic station), don't have any zone number on.

 

[Dave91131]

Unfortunately not. Only daily tickets are valid for 12 months if they are not activated.

A weekly ticket expires exactly a week after you first activate it.

Thanks - irrelevant to me in any case, but good for the OP and hopefully others to know.

 

[zero]

In 2017 I bought an iLink card online with a Zone 4 day ticket. It was posted to me in London, I then went to NI and used the ticket successfully. The card has been in a drawer ever since.

I have a planned trip to NI shortly. It looks like if I buy a ticket online, they will just post a new card to me, and there is no way to add it to my existing card or even see if my existing card still works. Is this right? Seems a bit of a waste.

I will probably fly into BFS airport. Can I buy a ticket on the existing card there? (Though I may just order a new card to save time and not risk being unable to use the old card.)

 

[185143]

In 2017 I bought an iLink card online with a Zone 4 day ticket. It was posted to me in London, I then went to NI and used the ticket successfully. The card has been in a drawer ever since.

I have a planned trip to NI shortly. It looks like if I buy a ticket online, they will just post a new card to me, and there is no way to add it to my existing card or even see if my existing card still works. Is this right? Seems a bit of a waste.

I will probably fly into BFS airport. Can I buy a ticket on the existing card there? (Though I may just order a new card to save time and not risk being unable to use the old card.)

Likewise for me, only at least I had mine for a week.

Seems rather wasteful, as you rightly say. That said, I really did appreciate them posting it out as it meant I could use it for the bus from the ferry terminal to my hotel. Having never really thought about it before, I assumed there'd be an extra charge for sending mail across the Irish sea given I've never had reason to do it. So was quite pleasantly surprised to see it delivered by Royal Mail in exactly the same was as if it had come from, say, Liverpool.

 

[Joe Paxton]

[...] I really did appreciate them posting it out as it meant I could use it for the bus from the ferry terminal to my hotel. Having never really thought about it before, I assumed there'd be an extra charge for sending mail across the Irish sea given I've never had reason to do it. So was quite pleasantly surprised to see it delivered by Royal Mail in exactly the same was as if it had come from, say, Liverpool.

Without wishing to spark a great historical and geopolitical discussion, Northern Ireland remains part of the UK - and Royal Mail, under their Universal Service Obligation, are required to provide postal services at a uniform public tariff across the whole of the UK.

 

[Flying Snail]

In 2017 I bought an iLink card online with a Zone 4 day ticket. It was posted to me in London, I then went to NI and used the ticket successfully. The card has been in a drawer ever since.

I have a planned trip to NI shortly. It looks like if I buy a ticket online, they will just post a new card to me, and there is no way to add it to my existing card or even see if my existing card still works. Is this right? Seems a bit of a waste.

I will probably fly into BFS airport. Can I buy a ticket on the existing card there? (Though I may just order a new card to save time and not risk being unable to use the old card.)

You can top them up at the tourist desk in the airport or from the driver on Ulsterbus services from the airport.

 

[zero]

You can put iLink day tickets onto na DayLink card which don't show any zones at all. The newer iLink cards which are slowly being phased in (I've only seen them at Eurospar next to Botanic station), don't have any zone number on.

In 2017 I bought an iLink card online with a Zone 4 day ticket. It was posted to me in London, I then went to NI and used the ticket successfully. The card has been in a drawer ever since.

I have a planned trip to NI shortly. It looks like if I buy a ticket online, they will just post a new card to me, and there is no way to add it to my existing card or even see if my existing card still works. Is this right? Seems a bit of a waste.

I called Translink and they said there was no way to see if my old card was still active other than physically going to an office or machine in NI.

So I did order a new card, and it still had Zone 4 printed on it.

The new card plus day ticket cost £18.50 online.

When I got to Belfast I found that the old card from 2017 was still working, though it said its most recent transaction took place in March 2033!

It was only possible to buy Zone 4 tickets on both cards, not any other zone, so individual cards would be needed if wanting different zones. The Z4 day ticket price with an existing card is £17.50, which means they charged £1 for the card plus postage. I couldn't find this information on the translink website.



Also buses still have the "driver covid protection screen" up, which makes it really awkward to get your card to the reader, you have to twist your arm through the hole, some elderly people really struggle to do this, and you have to take a separate ticket too...

There were very frequent revenue protection / anti-social behaviour deterrence checks on the Belfast Glider buses into the late evening/night... but anyone without a ticket was just made to get off, and no attempts were made to stop people getting off as the RPIs boarded. Also, the RPIs had to scan my card twice every time as the first scan always said it was invalid, but they anticipated this.