TfW Advance Flex Return

[AdamWW]

I've just discovered that TfW offer "Advance Flex Returns" - fixed train for the outward journey but anything you like for the return on the same day (so long as it's TfW).

I can't see anything on here about them but possibly I'm not seaching well enough.

This isn't a fare type I've come across so I'd be curious to know more.

It does strike me that if these are generally available up to departure time then using one won't be very different to a fully flexible return...and this permits a TOC only ticket to be sold that wouldn't otherwise be allowed.
Though I suppose that would work better if TfW had ticket vending machines that could sell Advance fares.

 

[mmh]

Other than them supposedly existing, I've never managed to get the TFW website or app to offer me one. The TFW website seems to have no information about them. There's a page on the National Rail website saying the ticket type exists, but I've never seen one on a brfares.com lookup.

They're a complete mystery to me but I'd love to know if they really do exist and how on earth you buy one as they'd be really useful to me.

 

[AdamWW]

Other than them supposedly existing, I've never managed to get the TFW website or app to offer me one. The TFW website seems to have no information about them. There's a page on the National Rail website saying the ticket type exists, but I've never seen one on a brfares.com lookup.

They're a complete mystery to me but I'd love to know if they really do exist and how on earth you buy one as they'd be really useful to me.

They are on offer for Cardiff to Carmarthen (and return) tomorrow at £23.30 which is the (only) price shown on BRFares.
BRFares shows them as route "TFW ONLY MFH-MAN".

An Anytime Day Return is £27.50 so I suppose they are effectively TfW only tickets offering a relatively small discount.
I presume they can't have a TfW only Anytime Day Return as they are the fare setter.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 22 May 2026 ==

I've just seen that Greater Anglia also offer a fare with the same name.

But they allow return any time within a month.
Also they don't offer railcard discounts which is a bit disappointing.

Meanwhile TfW seem to be more generous and are allowing railcard discounts.

It doesn't seem to me to be hugely helpful to have tickets with identical names and different validity rules, particularly given how harsh the railway can be with people who make mistakes with that sort of thing.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 23 May 2026 ==

Oh good grief - the National Rail web site says that TfW also have a "TFW Advance Flex Max" which lets you come back within 5 days.

 

[81A]

SWR offer a similar product called the “Semi Flex Return”.

 

[Kite159]

SWR offer a similar product called the “Semi Flex Return”.

Although the return for that is valid for a month, rather than the day as per the TfW ticket

 

[81A]

Although the return for that is valid for a month, rather than the day as per the TfW ticket

True and the SWR product also has fairly strict restrictions on the return half (I think similar to the SWR “Evening out” ticket restrictions).

 

[mmh]

I've completely failed to find any TFW station pair in North Wales and North West England with these tickets, so I can only presume this is a South Wales thing. Marvellous.

 

[Krokodil]

I've completely failed to find any TFW station pair in North Wales and North West England with these tickets, so I can only presume this is a South Wales thing. Marvellous.

They were devised for managing flows to/from the Principality Stadium. Try and spread people around booked trains on the way in, recognise that the return is going to be a free-for-all.

Given that the return portion is only valid for one day, I'd be surprised if you could practically use one from North Wales anyway, it's a long way for a day trip and there aren't many long distance trains left once the stadium has kicked out.

 

[Kite159]

They were devised for managing flows to/from the Principality Stadium.

Which I guess makes sense, you can plan what train you are catching to Cardiff, but with the queuing system in place after big events at the millennium stadium you can't be sure what time train you can depart on.

 

[Belperpete]

I've completely failed to find any TFW station pair in North Wales and North West England with these tickets, so I can only presume this is a South Wales thing. Marvellous.

How about Bangor and Chester? I bought a semi flex return from Bangor to Chester for a day out in Chester awhile back. I hadn't heard of them until the website offered the option.

Although the website clearly stated that they were semi flex tickets, and the ticket restriction AF code printed on the ticket was for semi flex, both out and back tickets stated "only valid on booked trains". I was therefore concerned that there might be an issue if I chose to return on another train. I was going to raise it at the new booking/info centre at Chester, but when I got there, there was a substantial queue, so I left it to when I returned. On the way back, I had predicted my return train correctly, so there was no problem.

These tickets are on BRfares, at £13.75 with Senior Railcard discount, which as I recall was about the same price as an advance single would have cost me. On BRfares, the outward validity is shown as BOOKDTRAINONLY, and the return validity is ON DATE SHOWN. However, in the details, both outward and return also say "A change of train is not permitted" - I take this to mean that the tickets are only valid on through trains?

 

[tumbledown]

There's a TFW Advance Flex fare for Manchester-Chester. This forum's ticket site shows it.

 

[AdamWW]

They were devised for managing flows to/from the Principality Stadium. Try and spread people around booked trains on the way in, recognise that the return is going to be a free-for-all.

That makes sense, though it now that they've invented them they must have decided to use them more widely.

SWR offer a similar product called the “Semi Flex Return”.

Although the return for that is valid for a month, rather than the day as per the TfW ticket

On the other hand Greater Anglia's equivalent tickets which are also valid for a month have exactly the same name as the TfW ones.

Does anyone here want to try to justify the railway offering tickets with exactly the same name and wildly different validity periods?

I realise this has happened because each TOC has done its own thing (and a move to GBR wouldn't help here) but perhaps there could be some kind of clearing house so that when a new ticket type is invented nobody else gets to use the same name for something different?

 

[Belperpete]

On the other hand Greater Anglia's equivalent tickets which are also valid for a month have exactly the same name as the TfW ones.

Do the GA and SWR (and others?) versions suffer from the same problem as the TfW version, in that the return ticket states "only valid on booked train?". I suspect that this is a problem with this wording being automatically printed on tickets that are classed as Advances.

 

[Haywain]

Does anyone here want to try to justify the railway offering tickets with exactly the same name and wildly different validity periods?

As long as the validity is clear at the point of sale I don't see a problem.

 

[Belperpete]

As long as the validity is clear at the point of sale I don't see a problem.

I don't see a problem at present, but I could if the different versions were offered on the same route, for example if Avanti were to start offering their own version of the flex advance on the North Wales coast with different validities to the TfW version.

It seems to me that the underlying problem is that new ticket types such as this are having to be shoe-horned into existing historic ticket definitions, hence these being defined as inflexible advances even though the return portion is a flexible ticket. There doesn't seem to be the flexibility needed to do this properly - things seem to have been frozen at privatisation.

 

[AdamWW]

As long as the validity is clear at the point of sale I don't see a problem.

I can quite believe that.

I don't see a problem at present, but I could if the different versions were offered on the same route, for example if Avanti were to start offering their own version of the flex advance on the North Wales coast with different validities to the TfW version.

I do.

People sometimes use trains in different areas at different times.

Especially given how harsh the railway can be I don't think it's reasonable to expect someone to make sure they check that a ticket with exactly the same name as one they are familiar with doesn't have different rules.

 

[Belperpete]

As long as the validity is clear at the point of sale I don't see a problem.

The problem is that it isn't clear at the point of sale. For advice on ticket validity, TfW point you to the National Rail website advice, which says that advances must be used on the booked trains. There is no mention of flexible advances, let alone different versions of them.

The validity code is equally unhelpful. Agreed it doesn't say that the return portion is only valid on the booked train, but equally it doesn't say that the generic condition does not apply, leaving it ambiguous. And the statement that a change of train is not permitted just confuses things further. And the coup de grace is the return portion of the ticket saying only valid on booked trains! Clear - no. Totally confusing - yes. The only place where the validity of the ticket seems to be spelt out is when you select it during the purchase.

 

[AdamWW]

The problem is that it isn't clear at the point of sale. For advice on ticket validity, TfW point you to the National Rail website advice, which says that advances must be used on the booked trains. There is no mention of flexible advances, let alone different versions of them.

The validity code is equally unhelpful. Agreed it doesn't say that the return portion is only valid on the booked train, but equally it doesn't say that the generic condition does not apply, leaving it ambiguous. And the statement that a change of train is not permitted just confuses things further. And the coup de grace is the return portion of the ticket saying only valid on booked trains! Clear - no. Totally confusing - yes. The only place where the validity of the ticket seems to be spelt out is when you select it during the purchase.

I tried on the app. On the screen where you are offered a choice of ticket, if you choose to click on "show details" you then get a lot of generic information, an explicit statement that break of journey isn't allowed and links to web pages for additional information and ticket restrictions.

The first of those links does go to a page that explains they are day returns.

That doesn't seem good enough to me though. Why is something as fundamental as length of validity hidden under "additional information", two clicks away from the ticket purchasing process?

The more I think about it the more it baffles me that someone would think that a passenger is at fault for not realising that the railway has created a ticket type that is a day return or a period return depending on operator.









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[Haywain]

I can quite believe that.

What's that supposed to mean?

On the screen where you are offered a choice of ticket, if you choose to click on "show details" you then get a lot of generic information, an explicit statement that break of journey isn't allowed and links to web pages for additional information and ticket restrictions.

The first of those links does go to a page that explains they are day returns.

That doesn't seem good enough to me though. Why is something as fundamental as length of validity hidden under "additional information", two clicks away from the ticket purchasing process?

I agree, it should be a bit more obvious.

The more I think about it the more it baffles me that someone would think that a passenger is at fault for not realising that the railway has created a ticket type that is a day return or a period return depending on operator.

Has anyone said that?