Apologies for the long post, I often split tickets for cross-London journeys, as it’s often cheaper to book Newark North Gate - London Kings Cross and London Paddington - Bristol.
I always ensure that I book to London Underground Zone 1 on one of the legs so the tickets “join up” so will end up with a Newark North Gate - London Underground Zone 1 and a London Paddington - Bristol Temple Meads single. I always ensure the minimum connection times are taken into account. Where possible, I use TrainSplit and get one booking reference, but sometimes due to extended booking horizons this isn’t possible.
When there’s been disruption on the first leg, there’s not usually been an argument about me getting the next train out of London, complying with the train operator restriction.
Recently however, I had an issue when collecting the ticket for the London Paddington to Bristol Temple Meads ticket. As a result, I had to visit the ticket office and it was printed on Paper Roll with a barcode. The Newark North Gate to London Underground zone 1 ticket was booked separately and was printed as a credit card sized ticket.
Unfortunately there was disruption between Newark and London on the 21st February due to signalling issues at Peterborough. The train eventually arrived at London King’s Cross 58 minutes late. I made my way to Paddington as quickly as possible using the tube but had missed my connecting train out of Paddington.
At first the gateline staff were reluctant to let me travel on the next train to Bristol as the Paddington-Bristol ticket was a paper roll ticket with barcode. They took a lot of persuading to allow me on the next train, and I was told that “just this once” I’d be allowed to travel, the reasons for the initial refusal were “barcode tickets can’t be used in any part of a cross London journey” and that there was “a crackdown on people doing cross-London journeys”and “ideally these should be done on CrossCountry as you get one ticket”
My initial opinion is that the staff member was a little misguided, however having seen the new barcode tickets coming out of ScotRail and Greater Anglia ticket machines I’m beginning to wonder if they’re telling the truth.
I always ensure that I book to London Underground Zone 1 on one of the legs so the tickets “join up” so will end up with a Newark North Gate - London Underground Zone 1 and a London Paddington - Bristol Temple Meads single. I always ensure the minimum connection times are taken into account. Where possible, I use TrainSplit and get one booking reference, but sometimes due to extended booking horizons this isn’t possible.
When there’s been disruption on the first leg, there’s not usually been an argument about me getting the next train out of London, complying with the train operator restriction.
Recently however, I had an issue when collecting the ticket for the London Paddington to Bristol Temple Meads ticket. As a result, I had to visit the ticket office and it was printed on Paper Roll with a barcode. The Newark North Gate to London Underground zone 1 ticket was booked separately and was printed as a credit card sized ticket.
Unfortunately there was disruption between Newark and London on the 21st February due to signalling issues at Peterborough. The train eventually arrived at London King’s Cross 58 minutes late. I made my way to Paddington as quickly as possible using the tube but had missed my connecting train out of Paddington.
At first the gateline staff were reluctant to let me travel on the next train to Bristol as the Paddington-Bristol ticket was a paper roll ticket with barcode. They took a lot of persuading to allow me on the next train, and I was told that “just this once” I’d be allowed to travel, the reasons for the initial refusal were “barcode tickets can’t be used in any part of a cross London journey” and that there was “a crackdown on people doing cross-London journeys”and “ideally these should be done on CrossCountry as you get one ticket”
My initial opinion is that the staff member was a little misguided, however having seen the new barcode tickets coming out of ScotRail and Greater Anglia ticket machines I’m beginning to wonder if they’re telling the truth.
