Train Brain Strain
I have become a regular visitor to Oxford as I am doing some research at the Oxford Internet Institute. This means exploring the wonderful world of railway timetables and tickets between London and Oxford. Having been completely bewildered by the different options I will post them here for my own future information and as a warning about how not to be customer friendly.
The options I think I have are as follows. To go there and back in a day I can get a Cheap Day Return. This costs �16-50 and is valid only after 9:30am for leaving London except for the 8:48am and 9:18am First Great Western Link trains which you can catch. There are other First Great Western trains via Reading before 9-30am that you cannot catch or you will pay �31-00 for a full day return.
If you want to go there one day and come back the next you can get a Network Away Break for �18-50, when bought in Oxford, or �19-00, when bought in London (why the difference?). This is valid for up to 5 days. It has a different set of restrictions so that you cannot get any trains out of London before 9:30am including the ones you would get with the Cheap Day Return (though different versions of this were given to me in Oxford, where they said I could get the earlier trains, and London, where they said I couldn’t).
If you want to buy a period return valid to come back up to a month later like you would for any other city you are told that these are simply not available. I have no idea why. You can get a period return for Sheffield to Oxford but not for London to Oxford.
And when it comes to timetables, bless the internet. This at least shows up the different options from different train companies, though I suspect that not all the possibilities are there. The printed timetables appear to be rigidly company by company so that you cannot see all the options together to work out which is best for you.
It is fortunate that residents of Oxford have brains the size of planets so that they can work all this out. I am struggling as poor punter but will no doubt get used to it.
I used to live in Oxford, and I remember the local train company produced a pocket Oxford < --> London timetable which showed all trains, even those run by other train companies. But I understand that the franchise has changed hands since I was last there so things may be different now.
Period returns tend not to be available for short(ish) distance journeys, although the rail industry’s understanding of “short” stretches it rather: I remember not being able to get a >5-day return for Oxford to Brighton.
I had to travel to Oxford at the weekend. Thanks to bus replacement services, it took a good two hours.
Travelling in to London that night (from Kent), we were barracked by a Revenue Enforcement Officer (or similar title) for not having tickets, which we were trying to buy at Charing Cross.
The ticket office was closed at our initial station. We were told we should’ve used the ticket machine.
Both ticket machines were out of order. We were told we should’ve bought a Permit to Travel.
The Permit to Travel machine had its “Not in use” light on. Eventually the official accepted that we weren’t lying.
Feel free to drop in.
Neil F.
It would be nice to have your opinion about my last post on meritocracy.
Whilst the train is a bit faster, and gives you a chance to do some work unless it’s crowded, the bus is much better if you want to travel at night. It’s cheaper, goes from Grosvenor Gardens by Victoria Station to the High Street and the Gloucester Road bus station (ie. closer to anywhere useful than the train station) and isn’t stopped by the wrong kind of rain.
Your gay
Your cool
Your a sad losser
“Your gay”?
My gay what? I’ve got a gay sister – would she do? Or did you mean to use gay as a noun? It’s not really very PC to describe someone as “a gay” these days, but I suppose given that she is my sister, and that she is gay, she could be described as “my gay”. Traditionally, one follows a subject with a verb and an object, rather than just leaving it hanging there by itself. She is pretty cool, but I don’t think you could really describe her as “a cool”, and I have no idea what “a sad losser” might be, or how I might find out whether I had one.
Period returns are only available for journeys over about 50 miles and going out of the old Network South East area.
The reason comes down to fraud control – commuters were buying period returns and using them several times, only buying
another one when it got inspected or when it expired. Sheffield is far enough, and there are enough inspections on
the trains, that this isn’t a significant problem.
By the way, according to Modern Railways there are less than 10 constituencies which don’t have a railway line, 3 in Scotland and the rest in urban England.
Guess what: Sheffield Hallam is one of them.
But we do! Dore station is in my constituency where some, but not enough, trains between Sheffield and Manchester stop.