As the UK Government delivered the bad news that English train fares will go up by 6.2% in January as it seeks to reduce the amount it spends on Transport, a UK based web site is trying to help.
MoneySavingExpert.com has developed a tool to exploit a weird loophole with UK train tickets. Sometimes it is cheaper to buy a ticket from Point A to Point B, and another from Point B to Point C, rather than buying one from Point A to Point C. This works as long as the train stops at Point B – no need to get off!
Their app only works for walk up tickets, which are typically much more expensive than advance purchase tickets, but could be useful to some.
In the example below, I wanted to travel from Southampton to Manchester. The walk up fare for today is £96.40, but if I buy two tickets (Southampton to Reading, and then Reading to Manchester), I can save £9.50 and stay in my seat all the way.
Good rhetorical touch saying “stay in my seat” but, having done this myself, it’s the one thing you probably cannot do. The system allocates seats randomly on each booking and you will probably have a different seat in a different carriage – at least I have on the occasions I’ve used this technique from London to Bodmin and vice versa, “stopping” at Exeter.