How a little known rail ticket can save substantial amounts
In recent weeks I’ve discovered a rail ticket that can save a pretty penny though you won’t find out much info about it.
Unlike a lot of clickbait headlines on certain websites stating something is “secret” when it’s actually revealed in a twenty second Google search, this actually is pretty hidden and websites on it inaccurate.
So what is it? Well, it’s the “accompanied child” ticket that allows a child to travel with an adult for £1 or £2 even if the adult has an existing ticket.
And more than that, it extends beyond the Network Railcard zone.
Online
If searching for this ticket online you’ll find this page on the National Rail website.
It states you can use it on Gatwick Express, Great Northern, Southern and Thameslink alongside Southeastern and Greater Anglia on restricted routes.
Greater Anglia have their own page which again isn’t exactly clear and appears to give inaccurate information stating it’s only valid on routes shared with other operators. Yet it can be used for journeys and destinations only served by GA.
I only discovered it talking to someone who booked a Manningtree to Norwich ticket. A route that is solely served by Greater Anglia and not the routes mentioned online.
You can’t buy online or at ticket machines so it’s off to a ticket office where they can be used to book for longer distance journeys than what is listed.
When buying a ticket for my daughter over the recent half-term holiday the staff member told me it could be used on routes to Ipswich and Norwich (and beyond?).
For some journeys a £1 or £2 return for children 5-16 certainly saves a decent chunk of cash. I had a prior ticket and this saved a fair bit compared to buying a standard child ticket.
Ticket offices
As stated the ticket cannot be bought online or at ticket machines. For those near Southeastern stations this perhaps isn’t the best news.
While the days over summer when unstaffed stations and ticket offices reached around triple figures, there’s still a good couple of dozen closed most days.
This little known ticket does again show the importance of well trained staff at stations – and them being accessible in a ticket office.
Thankfully plans to reduce staffing and move them out of ticket offices was scrapped. On the occasion I used it it was a tight connection and I managed to buy the tickets.
Now imagine if plans had gone through and even if staff were on site, they could be “roving” anywhere when I arrived rather than in a known place. You know, the actual ticket office.
Result would have been a missed connection and an hour-long wait for the next train.
Wow..thanks a bunch for this tip
Just booked a trip with greater anglia for xmas, I was already proud of finding a ticket for 16 pounds departing 5 minutes later than the standard one for 30 pounds; closer to travel time it becomes 45 pounds. In the end, most of the carriages are empty for that specific leg, so i don’t see the value of this dynamic pricing.
“This little known ticket does again show the importance of..” would change to -overhauling the pricing system and nationalising this ridiculous system where pricing is intentionally untransparent.
I wouldn’t expect nationalisation to do much given the first actions of this government. Forcing up railcard prices last week as well as above inflation fare increases of RPI+1 per cent sets out their stall. They’ll probably cut tickets like this if anything.
If you are unable to buy the ticket you want because e.g. the ticket office is shut and the machine won’t sell you one, you are perfectly entitled just get some kind of ticket and then sort it out at a later juncture.
From National Rail Conditions of Carriage:
3. Where the full range of tickets is not available
If you cannot buy an appropriate ticket for the journey you want to make because the range of tickets that is available at the station from which you intend to start your journey is restricted, you must buy a ticket or Permit to Travel before you travel that entitles you to make at least part of the journey. You must then, as soon as is reasonably practicable, buy an appropriate ticket to complete your journey. In these circumstances, you only need to pay the fare that you would have paid if you had bought a ticket immediately before your journey. The price you will have to pay will be reduced by the amount paid for the ticket or Permit to Travel.
Perhaps but the hassle sorting it with a child on a busy train would be difficult. Probably slung off and prosecuted with a long fight ahead
That condition as I read it only covers the situation where you buy a permit to travel (now effectively non-existent) or a ticket for part of the journey that costs less than the ticket you want to buy.
Good luck with finding a valid child ticket that costs less than £1 or £2….
I have a Network Southeast railcard and I use it whenever I do go into London or around London and I like how it works. I can’t use it when I’m going much further such as to other places I would like to visit and I sometimes go to Norwich because I used to live near Norwich but it’s outside of the zone.
And if only there was a Special Needs railcard that is catered to people who aren’t disabled but have other conditions and can use it anywhere they want to go to. Such as Aspergers/Autism, ADHD, Down Syndrome etc but can walk properly.
I have tried to apply for a Disabled railcard before but they recommended that I would use a wheelchair. But I actually don’t need it because I can walk properly but I have Autism. But I think that’s just discriminating on anyone who has a condition but isn’t disabled.