On 6 Sep, 23:53, "John Salmon" wrote:

Not usually true in my experience; it's a myth started by one of the
denigrators of GNER in uk.railway. I travelled from Retford to
London and back today using GNER Advance tickets, sitting in
unreserved coach H each way, wth no difficulty. Of course, they are
entitled to make you occupy your reserved seat, and apparently it
happens occasionally - but never to me.

On our trip to Edinburgh (First Advance), I'd removed the reservation
tickets from the seat to look at them - and left them on the table.
This was because we'd booked airline seats, but been given window
seats. More confusing than that was the fact that we had 'A' seats
(airline) but was told it stood for aisle. Great theory, except the
numbers meant window.. A doesn't mean window!

Anyway, he demanded our ticket AND reservations and then consulted a
notepad which seemed to have details of the reservations (he must have
seen the seat back tickets on the table, or could have asked). We
hadn't done anything wrong (or should we be fined £200 as mentioned on
the cards?), so he muttered something and wandered on, never to be
seen again for the whole journey.

On the way back, you couldn't have asked for a more friendly person to
check tickets, or serve tea and coffee.

When NatEx take over, I'd like to think they could be choosy about who
they keep but those damn TUPE rules will probably stop that
happening!!

Jonathan