Change of ticket type excess

[Mojo]

SVR Witham to London Terminals is £25.40 but is not valid to leave Liverpool Street before 09.30 on the return portion, but the person wants to leave on an earlier train.

I know the process for excessing on one leg of an off-peak return is that the difference between the fare paid and the appropriate return fare should be paid, but the only period return is the Off-peak return.

Is the correct excess £4.90, to the SDR (£30.30 - £25.40), or would a new SDS have to be purchased at £18.30 as the outward portion is for a different day?
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Also, this route is a penalty fares route and she will be travelling on a penalty fares train. I note from rule 7.2 that a penalty fare may not be charged if a ticket is invalid because of a time restriction. Does this mean that the excess charged on the train (whatever that is) would be the same as one purchased in advance at the ticket office?

 

[wintonian]

Are they coming back the same day? Otherwise I doubt(stranger things have happened though) you could excess to the SDR - that would seem a little odd.

 

[Mojo]

Are they coming back the same day? Otherwise I doubt(stranger things have happened though) you could excess to the SDR - that would seem a little odd.

No, they are doing the OUT on Tues and the RTN on Weds. There is no open return (the only ticket for out one day and back the other is the SVR) so not possible to excess to that.

 

[Failed Unit]

When it happened to me, I had to buy a full single (luckily at the barrier as I didn't know when the off-peak ended in the morning). They said write in and get the difference between the off-peak return and single refunded.

It is odd that in the South East they don't offer a period peak return like the do in the north.

Only Day return, cheap day return, off-peak return and singles.

In my case the most annoying thing was the person at the barrier never told me that the first off-peak train was 0942. I got charge the single for the 0842. I would have waited in st pancras had I known. As it happened the HS1 train was empty!

(off-peak = saver for me as well and open return doesn't exist)

I like simplification, different time restrictions in each area and peak period returns not available in the SouthEast. All designed to catch you out when away from your patch. A least in the north you can excess from off-peak to peak!

 

[wintonian]

I think the wording is something like:

Travel when not valid for time, day or train - Opportunity to buy before boarding

...

a) Travel in one direction
Off-Peak / Off-Peak Day Super Off-Peak / Super Off-Peak Day Charge the difference between the fare paid and the appropriate Return fare. If cheaper, customer may prefer
a new appropriate Single fare (but any return leg will remain subject to restrictions).
1) If Off-Peak are valid on the train Charge the difference between the fare paid and the Off-Peak Return fare. If cheaper, customer may prefer a new appropriate Single
fare (but any return leg will remain subject to restrictions).
2) If Off-Peak are not valid on the train Charge the difference between the fare paid and the appropriate Return fare. If cheaper, customer may prefer a new appropriate Single
fare (but any return leg will remain subject to restrictions).

Personally I would interpret that in this case as an appropriate return being a period return and a single should be sold as it is cheaper than the appropriate return - which doesn’t exist.

My 2p for what it’s worth as I could be wrong.

 

[reb0118]

OK This is probably not valid but I think the mobile avantix machines will allow excess from a SVR to a SDR.

When the excess comes out it will have an issue date on it BUT will state valid with ticket no 12345 ie the original ticket.

As the original ticket is valid in the return portion for a month you should get away with it. Maybe?

 

[island]

Don't count on it. The dark arts of excesses are a mystery to many, including a decent proportion of TOC ticket office staff.

 

[FGWman]

Most stations in the NSE area dont have SOR. It goes back to the days when Network South East was started. They got rid of the barriers so peoples tickets were not checked on leaving the station. If you have SOR tickets then obviously they can be used again and again.

They found very few people were making such journeys anyway so they withdrew the ticket and only issued SDR. They also did not have SVR returns for most journeys but had a Network AwayBreak instead which the return was only valid for 5 days.

The correct excess used to be the difference between the price paid and two SDS. So in this case it would be 18.30 x2 minus 25.40 which is 11.20 but I dont know if this still applies. If they know there journey already they would be better off buying two singles.

edit Just checked and the excess is now a single fare. So if travelling off peak on the outward journey cheaper to bu two singles

 

[Failed Unit]

It would be good to see the South East operators standardise the rest of the UK. I know an Anytime return = 2x Anytime singles. Peoples plans change so you need a reasonable way of upgrading an off-peak to anytime without having to buy a new single!

 

[Mojo]

So confused. So what is the XS? Sounds like it's cheaper to get a ticket for a longer journey & finish short, taking advantage of more lenient restrictions.
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It would be good to see the South East operators standardise the rest of the UK. I know an Anytime return = 2x Anytime singles. Peoples plans change so you need a reasonable way of upgrading an off-peak to anytime without having to buy a new single!

Well it's laughable anyway that someone trying to LEAVE London Terminals at 8.50 am can be classified as travelling peak anyway.

I was on a train about 0830-0900 on a weekday from St Pancakes to Derby a few weeks ago. About 20 people across a train formed of 2 x 222s no decent Apex tickets and most pax would have only been valid on the most expensive fares.

 

[Failed Unit]

So confused. So what is the XS? Sounds like it's cheaper to get a ticket for a longer journey & finish short, taking advantage of more lenient restrictions.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
Well it's laughable anyway that someone trying to LEAVE London Terminals at 8.50 am can be classified as travelling peak anyway.

I was on a train about 0830-0900 on a weekday from St Pancakes to Derby a few weeks ago. About 20 people across a train formed of 2 x 222s no decent Apex tickets and most pax would have only been valid on the most expensive fares.

Same story with the 0842 st pancras - Margate! Peak service + hs1 = no passengers. As posted earlier what annoyed me the most was the person that sold me the single didn't point out if I waited another hour I would save myself £28 as my off peak ticket would be valid!

 

[barrykas]

So confused. So what is the XS? Sounds like it's cheaper to get a ticket for a longer journey & finish short, taking advantage of more lenient restrictions.

As there's no Anytime Return for the journey in question, it'd be a new Single ticket.

You could try to get a refund on the unused part of the Off-Peak Return, but I suspect that such a refund would incur the usual admin fee of a tenner for NXEA, in which case you wouldn't get anything back, as the difference in fares is only £7.10.

Cheers,

Barry

 

[Mojo]

Thanks Barry & all other respondents. Will get an O/D excess instead; even though the price of that itself is a lottery!