"Martin Underwood" wrote in message
...
"Piccadilly Pilot" wrote in message
...

"Martin Underwood" wrote in message
...
"Marcus Fox" wrote in
message ...
Travelled from Haywards Heath to Newark last Sunday. Asked for the
cheapest
way, and was told it would be £54. But when I got home, I checked
prices
online and found that a single From HH to Kings Cross Thameslink is
£15.70
and a single from Kings Cross to Newark is £30.40. Total price
£46.10.
Why
such the difference in price?

Shows that you can't trust the answer given by the staff in a station
(I
presume it was at HH ticket office that you asked for the cheapest
fare).
Given a question like "what is the cheapest fare from HH to Newark",
the
ticket office should have searched for the cheapest combination of
tickets
(not beyond the wit of a computer) and sold you the two tickets that
you
mention.

I bet you're well ****ed-off that they sold you a more expensive
ticket...


Doesn't that rather depend on the instructions given to the booking
office
staff and also exactly how the intending purchaser phrases the
question?.

It does: but I think "what is the cheapest fare from HH to Newark?" should
elicit the cheapest possible fare even if that involves multiple tickets.

I suspect that most people faced with that question would not go the the
trouble of wading through the NFM to get the answer the intending purchaser
was wanting (but didn't actually ask for). The question would have to much
more tightly phrased than that.

But then of course it is not in the *railway's* best interests to tell you
this, only in the *passenger's" best interests. Where there is a conflict
of
interest, who *can* you trust to give you information about the cheapest
ticket?

No one.