Student commuting to work with 16-25 railcard before 10am

[golden19]

Hi everyone,
I’m starting an internship next week which will require I commute into London from Epsom at 7am and back to Epsom at 7pm. I was planning on using my railcard as I normally would do for journeys into London but have just seen online that a student got fined for using their 16-25 railcard before 10am which I didn’t even know was a thing. After looking online I see that it is fine travelling before 10 with a railcard for a journey costing £12 or over? My journey will be £17 so I’m just wondering whether this is allowed or will I have to buy tickets without my railcard?
Thank you for any assistance in advance.

 

[Haywain]

It's allowed and perfectly acceptable. And the small bonus is that the minimum fare doesn’t apply during July and August.

 

[pelli]

If you haven't already, you could also look into using Oyster Pay-As-You-Go, as attaching your 16-25 railcard gives 1/3 discount on off-peak fares (see the TFL Single Fare Finder or MikeWh's unofficial Oyster Fare Finder for prices). The resulting fares would typically be e.g. £8.80 peak / £4.00 off-peak for a single journey on the train between Epsom and Waterloo/Victoria (or continuing on by National Rail only), or £10.70 peak / £5.20 off-peak if you continue on the tube.

Two peak PAYG singles compare unfavourably to a railcard-discounted Anytime Day Return (e.g. £12.10 to London Terminals or £16.10 to London Underground Zone 1), but TfL is currently (until 31 May) trialling off-peak all day on Fridays, so you're likely better off using Oyster then. You also get the off-peak PAYG fare if you touch in for your journey before 6.30am or after 7.00pm, so depending on your specific timings and ultimate destination you might find Oyster to be cheaper on other days of the week too.

 

[Watershed]

The 16-25 Railcard has a minimum fare of £12 before 10am Monday-Friday. This restriction doesn't apply to Advance tickets, or during the months of July and August; the discount also works differently if you apply your Railcard to an Oyster card. Each Railcard has different restrictions, so check this carefully if you buy a different Railcard in future.

The effect of the minimum fare rule is as follows:

• If the undiscounted fare is £12 or less, a 16-25 Railcard doesn't allow any discount before 10am
• If the undiscounted fare is between £12.05 and £18.10, you can choose to buy a partially discounted fare costing exactly £12 if you want to travel before 10am, or a fully discounted fare with the full 34% off if you want to travel from 10am onwards
• If the undiscounted fare is £18.15 or more, you receive the full discount regardless of when you travel

The undiscounted cost of an Anytime Day Return from Epsom to London Terminals (which permits travel to London Bridge, London Victoria, Waterloo etc.) is £18.40. Therefore, you can use your Railcard for the full 34% off, reducing this to £12.10, and travel at any time of day. Online booking sites and apps reflect this, offering the £12.10 fully discounted fare at any time of day.

Where people have got into trouble it's generally because they've searched for trains after 10am, bought a ticket discounted to less than £12, and then used this at (say) 7am. Although an Anytime fare is flexible and in principle valid on any train, the minimum fare rule overrides this and means that if the fare is discounted to less than £12, it's not valid before 10am.

In my view, using a fare discounted to less than £12 before 10am isn't something that justifies a Penalty Fare or prosecution - especially since there is nothing on the face of the ticket to point out that an "Anytime" ticket is not, in fact, valid at any time. Unfortunately the train companies have other ideas, and they tend to apply a much harsher approach, especially if they can see that someone has repeatedly (perhaps quite unknowingly) done this over a long period of time.