Advance ticket bought by a friend - valid?

[jj1314]

Hi all.

I have a couple of questions regarding the validity of an advance single, travelling tomorrow (Friday) morning.

The ticket was bought three weeks ago covering a journey from Penzance to Bangor (Gwynedd) and was booked with a 16-25 railcard discount. It was bought by a friend through the XC website (and collected through the ticket machine at Penzance station) so has their surname printed with the reservation details.

On the basis that I have a perfectly valid railcard, can I use the ticket? Does the presence of my friend's surname on the ticket affect its validity if I board the trains tomorrow with a railcard bearing my own name?

My hunch is that buying a train fare for somebody online is completely reasonable (especially given that I'm a skinflint student and my friend bought the ticket for me - I can buy tickets for 2 adults, simultaneously, at a ticket machine without breaking any rules paying with my own card) and doesn't constitute a transfer of the ticket or whatnot. However, the T&Cs are vague and I've read 'horror stories' of people using e-tickets with other people's details and facing court action.

Can anybody help? I'm suddenly quite worried and due to travel in 25 hours!

Cheers in advance.

 

[LexyBoy]

If your friend bought the ticket for herself, you cannot use it (officially speaking) as tickets are non-transferable.

If she bought it for you in the first place, then that's fine - the name printed doesn't affect the validity.

(Print at home e-Tickets are different - you must be the named person. This doesn't apply to tickets collected from the machine, it's to stop several copies being printed out)

 

[dzug2]

It's not an e-ticket - they have special T&C

It was bought specifically for you

you have the appropriate railcard

There shouldn't be a problem