Tim Roll-Pickering wrote:
Mizter T wrote:
See this from the FAQ section of the Young Person Railcard website -
the last sentence in particular...
(I've copied it in full for posterity should they ever correct it)
-----
14. Can I use my Railcard for tickets for travel on the London
Underground? All discounted rail tickets bought using your Railcard
routed 'between London termini' are valid for cross-London transfer on
the London Underground. Off-Peak Day Travelcards (All Zones only) are
also available, subject to a minimum fare. Please note, however, that
you cannot use your Railcard to obtain a discount when purchasing
tickets from a London Underground booking office.
-----
Does this also mean I can't get a YPR discount on an Amersham to Aylesbury
ticket (a journey I'm due to make several times).
(Indeed what's the cheapest way to get a good discount on an extension from
a 1-6 travelcard to Aylesbury? PAYG to Amersham, then buy a return ticket at
the office there and on the way back jump onto the platform to touch in then
back onto the train, or a straightforward extension from Marylebone/Harrow?)
Tim Roll-Pickering wrote:
Mizter T wrote:
See this from the FAQ section of the Young Person Railcard website -
the last sentence in particular...
(I've copied it in full for posterity should they ever correct it)
-----
14. Can I use my Railcard for tickets for travel on the London
Underground? All discounted rail tickets bought using your Railcard
routed 'between London termini' are valid for cross-London transfer on
the London Underground. Off-Peak Day Travelcards (All Zones only) are
also available, subject to a minimum fare. Please note, however, that
you cannot use your Railcard to obtain a discount when purchasing
tickets from a London Underground booking office.
-----
Does this also mean I can't get a YPR discount on an Amersham to Aylesbury
ticket (a journey I'm due to make several times).
Usefully if and when you manage to get an LU ticket office to sell you
a YPR-discounted all-zones Day Travelcard they actually throw in zones
A-D as well for no extra cost, so that makes it better value to
actually buy said YPR-discounted Travelcard from an LU as opposed to a
National Rail (NR) ticket office! Of course most people wouldn't care
as they're not going out to the far reaches of the Metropolitan Line in
Buckinghamshire, but for those who are it's well worth knowing.
This has been mentioned several times before on this newsgroup by
several people so whilst I haven't done it myself I'm certain it is the
case. In particular see this June 2005 uk.railway thread via Google
Groups [1] (the FAQ numbering on the YPR website I refer to has
obviously been changed around since then).
Why this is the case is a different matter. I guess in part because
it's convenient administratively for LU to throw A-D in for free -
perhaps they've done it unilaterally as it has no impact on NR TOCs
(apart of course from Chiltern Railways given the interavailbility of
LU tickets on their services - though they have a specifically
intertwined relationship with LU, and they have presumable agreed to
it).
I also guess NR don't issue such YPR-discounted Travelcards as zones
A-D is LU territory, which is a shame. It's also possible to buy from
NR ticket offices a _non-discounted_ Day Travelcard that covers zones
A-D - see section L of the NR National Fares Manual (page L1 [2]) - but
seemingly you can only do this for the off-peak Fay Travelcard, not the
peak version.
(Whilst that section mentions Cheap-Day Returns to the Buckinghamshire
Met Line stations I'm sure that only applies to journeys coming from
the other way on the Chiltern Line - i.e. Aylesbury - allowing a change
from a Chiltern train onto a Met Line train if needed to complete the
journey.)
(Indeed what's the cheapest way to get a good discount on an extension from
a 1-6 travelcard to Aylesbury? PAYG to Amersham, then buy a return ticket at
the office there and on the way back jump onto the platform to touch in then
back onto the train, or a straightforward extension from Marylebone/Harrow?)
If you're using Oyster PAYG (on either the Met or Chiltern) then you'd
need to touch out at Amersham, likewise coming back from Aylesbury
you'd need to touch in again (if you don't you're subject to a Penalty
Fare, the unresolved journey doesn't contribute to your daily cap and
from November you'll be charged £4 for unresolved journeys). At
Amersham there's gates in operation, at least some of the time, which
might well make jumping off and on the same train a bit of an
impossible mission!
You can of course buy a ticket at Marylebone (or from any NR ticket
office - notionally at least!) from either the boundary of zone 6, or
Amersham, to Aylesbury. The Harrow-on-the-Hill ticket office is run by
LU who might either not be able to do this or struggle to do it, I
don't know.
Not knowing how often you'll have to make the journey, at what time
you'll be setting off and where you're starting from it's hard to say
what you're best option is.
Remember that (in theory at least) you could buy a YPR-discounted Day
Travelcard from an LU ticket office (thus getting the free zones A-D)
in advance.
-----
[1] June 2005 uk.railway thread
http://groups.google.co.uk/group/uk....c2cc172dc479cc
or via shortURL http://tinyurl.com/oposx
[2] National Fares Manual - Section L
http://www.atoc.org/retail/_download...4_Common_L.pdf