Pointless Anytime Day Return fares into Travelcard area

[Bletchleyite]

I notice that there are point to point Anytime Day Return fares from Bletchley to East Croydon, one routed +LONDON and one routed via Kensington Olympia.

The thing is, though, that the Anytime Day Travelcard from Bletchley is significantly cheaper than both of these and is valid via either route, and has the added benefit of allowing a choice of modes and a break of journey when crossing London if electing to go that way.

Is there any possible benefit to the existence of these fares? Are there many such poor value point to point day return fares that should never be sold for journeys to/from the Travelcard area?

(NRE, when you search, correctly directs you to the Travelcard as the lowest fare)

 

[northwichcat]

Are railcard discounts available on Travelcards? If not then for railcard holders a railcard discounted Anytime Day Return may be the best option.

Similar to the above I've noticed for some journeys where the TfGM Wayfarer is valid some Off-Peak Day Returns are more expensive than the Wayfarer ticket.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Are railcard discounts available on Travelcards?

Yes, so that isn't a reason for them to exist. Perhaps Privs?

 

[higthomas]

It's probably there to make East Croydon-Bletchley returns possible. You can't buy a travelcard the wrong way around. You can of course buy a travelcard and a boundary zone 6-Bletchley return (which is a cheaper combination), but that's not so simple.

 

[Starmill]

This is very common. There would not really be any point in changing them though, what would you change them to?

Should they change Bletchley to Redhill too? You would be crazy to buy a Bletchley to Redhill SDR [Anytime Day Return] for £62.50, rather than a Bletchely Anytime Day Travelcard for £43.70 and a Boundary Zone 6 to Redhill SDR for £8.10.

I am sure people will still pay the higher fare - in both cases.

The root cause is that outboundary travelcards are generally sold at quite a discount. It is only £6.30 more for the Travlecard from Bletchley than a return to London Terminals, rather than the £17.50 the Travelcard costs by itself.

By the way Bletchley to London Terminals SDRs are incredibly expensive for the service level on offer! Almost £40!? Bletchley does not have the 'premium' service Milton Keynes Central does, and from Leighton Buzzard it's a far more reasonable £30.

Far, far worse than this are the cases where stations within zones are overpriced.

For example, a Zones 1-9 Anytime Day Travelcard is £22.10. But an Anytime Day Return from Watford High Street (Zone 8) to Dartford (Zone 8) is a shocking £30.20. An Amersham (Zone 9) to Swanley (Zone 8) reuturn is £34.

 

[Kite159]

This is very common. There would not really be any point in changing them though, what would you change them to?

Should they change Bletchley to Redhill too? You would be crazy to buy a Bletchley to Redhill SDR [Anytime Day Return] for £62.50, rather than a Bletchely Anytime Day Travelcard for £43.70 and a Boundary Zone 6 to Redhill SDR for £8.10.

I am sure people will still pay the higher fare - in both cases.

The root cause is that outboundary travelcards are generally sold at quite a discount. It is only £6.30 more for the Travlecard from Bletchley than a return to London Terminals, rather than the £17.50 the Travelcard costs by itself.

By the way Bletchley to London Terminals SDRs are incredibly expensive for the service level on offer! Almost £40!? Bletchley does not have the 'premium' service Milton Keynes Central does, and from Leighton Buzzard it's a far more reasonable £30.

Far, far worse than this are the cases where stations within zones are overpriced.

For example, a Zones 1-9 Anytime Day Travelcard is £22.10. But an Anytime Day Return from Watford High Street (Zone 8) to Dartford (Zone 8) is a shocking £30.20. An Amersham (Zone 9) to Swanley (Zone 8) reuturn is £34.

The last two are probably left overs from the days when Dartford & Swanley were outside the zones

I'm sure some people will pay the higher cost, if they are travelling for business and claiming back the ticket cost, or getting the tickets booked for their behalf by a 3rd party booker (who might not know the existence of the travelcard fare being cheaper)

 

[Bletchleyite]

Should they change Bletchley to Redhill too? You would be crazy to buy a Bletchley to Redhill SDR [Anytime Day Return] for £62.50, rather than a Bletchely Anytime Day Travelcard for £43.70 and a Boundary Zone 6 to Redhill SDR for £8.10.

It wouldn't be hard to run a batch job to hunt out and correct such anomalies.

 

[Bletchleyite]

For example, a Zones 1-9 Anytime Day Travelcard is £22.10. But an Anytime Day Return from Watford High Street (Zone 8) to Dartford (Zone 8) is a shocking £30.20. An Amersham (Zone 9) to Swanley (Zone 8) reuturn is £34.

That really needs decomplicating by removing the point to point fares entirely and just having a set of zonal fares within the Zones.

 

[Starmill]

It wouldn't be hard to run a batch job to hunt out and correct such anomalies.

Well, it would. How would you fix it? For a start some of the tickets are priced by Southern and some LM. Would you change all of the ones to everywhere south of London to include the discount based on buying the Travelcard, without actually buying the Travelcard? That will get very messy very quickly. Sometimes there's an Off-Peak Return too which is more expensive.

Cheshunt, Dartford and Swanley have been in zones for a long time now but it's no surprise that rip-off fares still exist. Lots were reduced a while ago to account for some new arrivals to zones 7-9 but clearly it needs to be done again.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Well, it would. How would you fix it? For a start some of the tickets are priced by Southern and some LM. Would you change all of the ones to everywhere south of London to include the discount based on buying the Travelcard, without actually buying the Travelcard? That will get very messy very quickly.

It's not dissimilar to any other split, but in principle splitting should never be cheaper than a through fare with the same restrictions. And unlike most splits these cases don't impose any additional restrictions - rather the cheaper split is *less* restrictive, allowing things like cross-London transfer by bus with break of journey allowed.

 

[OwlMan]

This just does not apply to London -it happens all over the ountry

For example Burton On Trent to New Mills Central - Off peak reurn £38;
Derbyshire Wayfarer £12.60.

Parbold to Buxton £17 Manchester Wayfarer £13

Narborough to Wolverhampton 7 day season £100.20
Narborough to West Midlands All Zones 7 day season £48.90

There are examples all over the country where tickets are issued by or on behalf of a local council, PTE or TFL

 

[Starmill]

My favourite is a Crewe to Northampton single for £47.10 (route Long Buckby) - or a West Midlands Day Ranger for £25.60.

Or Manchester Stations to New Mills Central Annual Season £1,156.00, GM Traincard Annual, £955.60.

 

[bb21]

The £47.10 ticket is valid in the peak so does serve a purpose.

 

[Starmill]

Which does rather make one wonder what the £58 single is for.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Which does rather make one wonder what the £58 single is for.

Travel via MKC.

 

[Starmill]

Travel via MKC.

With a route Long Buckby ticket? I think not :P

 

[greatkingrat]

Which does rather make one wonder what the £58 single is for.

That is an Anytime Single so allows you to break your journey and resume the following day.

 

[Starmill]

Which makes me wonder why the OP is happy with that and not with the much less easy to solve issue of Anytime Day Returns in the travelcard area.

 

[Bletchleyite]

With a route Long Buckby ticket? I think not :P

Ah, it's an 8a off peak? No, I don't support the existence of those, they should be changed to be Anytimes.

 

[Starmill]

Ah, it's an 8a off peak? No, I don't support the existence of those, they should be changed to be Anytimes.

No, 8A Off-Peak tickets actually have restrictions on break of journey (on the outward portion at least). It's a 2T Off-Peak which is only restricted to not being valid before 0415. Break of journey is permitted.

This second only in strangeness to A1 Off-Peak tickets.

 

[Bletchleyite]

This second only in strangeness to A1 Off-Peak tickets.

Having just looked that up, is that a way of doing "Anytime Short Returns" without them being Anytime Short Returns / before anyone thought of that?

 

[Andrew1395]

They are probably there for ORCATS allocations reasons too. The outboundary travelcard ticket will be apportioned using the Travelcard agreement private settlement allocations.