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).

(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

Mizter T wrote:

(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!

There are also readers on the London bound platform (at least - I've never
looked on the other two). I have managed to jump off touch in jump on for a
single train before but I agree it's messy.

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.

Generally I travel during the day - anytime leaving Baker Street any time
from noon til three. It's a journey probably made on average every three
months.

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.

Yup - but aside from all the hassle, I have a zones 1-6 season travelcard so
I'm looking at the extension option only.

Mizter T wrote:

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.


Au contraire. It's entirely possible for an NR Ticket Office to issue a
Travelcard including A-D [1] by doing it as if you'd bought it *from*
Amersham. [2]

It was covered in an issue of Newsrail Express, but said issue appears
to be no longer on the ATOC website.

HTH,

Barry

[1] Unless you want one with a Y-P or Forces Discount, it's a weekday,
and they're using FasTIS, as it erroneously applies the £8 Minimum Fare

[2] In other words, by issuing an Amersham to Zone R1256 Travelcard

On Tue, 10 Oct 2006 02:01:44 +0100, Barry Salter wrote:

Au contraire. It's entirely possible for an NR Ticket Office to issue a
Travelcard including A-D [1] by doing it as if you'd bought it *from*
Amersham. [2]

[2] In other words, by issuing an Amersham to Zone R1256 Travelcard

Would such a ticket be valid to Chesham?

asdf wrote:
On Tue, 10 Oct 2006 02:01:44 +0100, Barry Salter wrote:

Au contraire. It's entirely possible for an NR Ticket Office to issue a
Travelcard including A-D [1] by doing it as if you'd bought it *from*
Amersham. [2]

[2] In other words, by issuing an Amersham to Zone R1256 Travelcard

Would such a ticket be valid to Chesham?

Yes, Chesham is in Zone D

On 10 Oct 2006 04:48:26 -0700, wrote:

Au contraire. It's entirely possible for an NR Ticket Office to issue a
Travelcard including A-D [1] by doing it as if you'd bought it *from*
Amersham. [2]

[2] In other words, by issuing an Amersham to Zone R1256 Travelcard

Would such a ticket be valid to Chesham?

Yes, Chesham is in Zone D

And would the ticket be valid throughout Zone D? ISTM it would just be
valid to Amersham (and even then, for just one return journey from
Amersham to Moor Park, plus unlimited travel in Z1-6).

asdf wrote:
On 10 Oct 2006 04:48:26 -0700, wrote:

Au contraire. It's entirely possible for an NR Ticket Office to issue a
Travelcard including A-D [1] by doing it as if you'd bought it *from*
Amersham. [2]

[2] In other words, by issuing an Amersham to Zone R1256 Travelcard

Would such a ticket be valid to Chesham?

Yes, Chesham is in Zone D

And would the ticket be valid throughout Zone D? ISTM it would just be
valid to Amersham (and even then, for just one return journey from
Amersham to Moor Park, plus unlimited travel in Z1-6).

Well strictly speaking its valid for unlimited journeys between
Amersham and zones 1-6 (so you could go to Amersham, pop to
Rickmansworth, then back to Amersham before going home - if you really
want to) but you'd have no trouble getting to Chesham also. This issue
with NR tickets is well known to staff.

Barry Salter wrote:

Mizter T wrote:

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.


Au contraire. It's entirely possible for an NR Ticket Office to issue a
Travelcard including A-D [1] by doing it as if you'd bought it *from*
Amersham. [2]

It was covered in an issue of Newsrail Express, but said issue appears
to be no longer on the ATOC website.

HTH,

Barry


You've missed my point! You have however raised some other issues I'd
like to comment on. I'll start by clarifying things.

[Pages numbers quoted refer to Section L or F of the NFM].

(1) What I was trying to get across is this - when you buy a railcard
discounted Day Travelcard (YPR or any of the other railcards) what you
get depends on where you bought it:

* Buy at an NR ticket office and you'll get a plain-vanilla zones 1-6
off-peak Day Travelcard.

* Buy at an Underground ticket office and you'll get a zones 1-D
off-peak Day Travelcard - i.e. LU chucks in zones A-D for _free_.

Contributors to utl and uk.railway have stated many times that this is
LU's modus operandi - for example see this 2006 thread [1].

Bizarrely ATOC's publicity for some railcards wrongly denies it's even
possible to buy a railcard-discounted Day Travelcard from an LU ticket
office - see the FAQ answers on the YPR, Family Railcard and Senior
Railcard websites [2] - similar text is included in the T&Cs in the
leaflets for those railcards.


(2) Page L1 details "Through Fares to LU Met Line Stations Outside the
London Fare Zones Area".

The add-on to the off-peak Day Travelcard price of £1.10 makes sense -
it's the difference between the price of a Z1-6 Travelcard (£ 6.30)
and a Z1-D Travelcard (£7.40).

_But_ tickets are issued as point-to-point CDRs - so someone who wanted
to visit several stations in Zones A-D (for example go for a walk
between Amersham and Chesham, or visit both Amersham and Watford)
couldn't do this with an NR point-to-point ticket. Thus they;d get a
less flexible ticket than if they'd purchased a Zones A-D Day
Travelcard from an LU ticket office.

Also it's unclear to me whether a railcard holder could get any
discount on an NR-issued Day Travelcard with an add-on CDR to Chesham.
_If_ it was possible would it be a discounted £4.80 Day Travelcard
plus a discounted CDR at 75p (i.e. third off £1.10) equalling £5.55?
Or would it just be a third off £7.40, so £4.95. (I'm not sure how
rail fares are rounded up or down so apols for any minor errors there).

Given that page K1.8 states "Railcard discounts do not apply to these
LU only tickets" so it appears the above scenarios are not possible.

Even if either was possible, it would still be more expensive than the
railcard reduced Zones 1-D Day Travelcard issued by LU, price £4.80 -
where Zones A-D are thrown in for free.


(3) Ignoring the issue of railcard reductions it would be much easier
if NR ticket offices were just able to issue straightforward Zones 1-D
Day Travelcards. Page K1.7, which is concerned with how to issue zonal
extensions to Travelcard holders, bizarrely re-categorises Zones A-D as
Zones 7-10! It really doesn't have to be this complicated!


(4) The language used on pages K1.3 and K1.4, section K of the NFM is,
I think, a little unclear. Under the "Out-Boundary" heading of the peak
and off-peak Day Travelcard sections it states "Tickets are also
available from the following LU stations on the Met Line at the
following prices: [...]".

To the uninitiated this almost suggests that a passenger can only buy
these tickets from the listed Met Line stations. Of course this is
wrong as any NR ticket office can issue a ticket from any other station
on the network - nonetheless I wouldn't necessarily see the harm in
including a sentence making this explicit. That said, the NFM is an
internal document and I suppose it's written on the presumption that
staff who consult it shouldn't need to be reminded of such things.


[1] Unless you want one with a Y-P or Forces Discount, it's a weekday,
and they're using FasTIS, as it erroneously applies the £8 Minimum Fare


Something that should IMO be corrected ASAP.

On Mon, 9 Oct 2006 02:21:10 +0100, Tim Roll-Pickering 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).

I think the answer is that you can.


As far as I can work out, the rules for using Railcards at LU ticket
offices are as follows. These have been pieced together from a
combination of anecdotes, personal experience, and educated guesswork,
so if anyone has any official sources of this information, or any
experiences that contradict the below, I'd be interested to hear them.

- At all LU ticket offices, any valid Railcard may be used to purchase
a Zones 1-D ODTC for £4.80 for the holder (and, if the type of
Railcard normally permits it, for accompanying persons).

(If using a Gold Card, one of the following rules may apply:
-you can't buy a discounted ODTC for yourself; or
-if your annual season doesn't include a Z1-6 Travelcard, and if you
want to buy discounted ODTCs for other people, you *must* also buy one
for yourself.)

- At LU ticket offices at stations served by NR (e.g. Blackhorse Road,
Greenford, West Brompton), you can also buy Railcard discounted
Standard/Cheap Day Singles/Returns, for journeys that *only* involve
NR.

(This might not apply on Thameslink/Chiltern, to those journeys where
Tube fares apply even if you use NR.)

- NO other Railcard discounted tickets are available. Not even if you
have a Gold Card issued by LU. So if you turn up at Oxford Circus and
ask for a ticket to Brighton, you can't get a Railcard discount
(although you would have been able to if you'd bought your ticket in
advance at a NR ticket office). Even if you have a Z1-6 annual
Travelcard and just want an extension to Brighton, you don't get a
discount on it.

(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?)

Find out the price of a Boundary Zone 6 to Aylesbury return (not
available online). Compare this to the price of an Amersham-Aylesbury
return plus a pair of zone A-D PAYG singles.

Incidentally, the former would also allow you to travel via High
Wycombe, giving a bit of extra flexibility. And you wouldn't have to
leave the train at Amersham in search of a validator (possibly missing
it and having to wait for the next one).