Claygate to Reading

[LexyBoy]

Wanting to travel from Claygate to Reading tonight, with a Reading-London Travelcard but wanting to travel via Guildford as it's quicker than going via CJ.

Now, my understanding is that a Travelcard is valid for any permitted route to London group, not any station within the TC coverage, which is a pity as the route via Guildford and Claygate is valid for Reading-Surbiton

Anyway, can anyone come up with a better solution than a Claygate-Ascot Off Peak Single (£6.25 with Gold Card), which is valid to Wokingham (and thence the Travelcard is valid to Reading). (If I'm wrong about the Travelcard routeing then I'm happy to be corrected ).

 

[yorkie]

Now, my understanding is that a Travelcard is valid for any permitted route to London group, not any station within the TC coverage, which is a pity as the route via Guildford and Claygate is valid for Reading-Surbiton

Possibly, but this is not documented anywhere, and there was a thread about this issue and it was not conclusive. My advice would be try to get the best itinerary for your needs on a booking site, book it, and bring the itinerary.

 

[LexyBoy]

I assume you mean this thread? I think that's the one I had in the back of my mind.

How did you check the validity of routes to the boundary zone on the booking engines? Using Chiltern's WebTIS interface gave a result of "No fares available" on requesting a Reading-London Travelcard and travelling via Guildford. (In any case it's a Travelcard Season so wouldn't be booking trains).

Certainly the only information I've managed to find on National Rail agrees with your interpretation (my bold):

Travelcard Season Tickets allow unlimited travel at any time of day on National Rail, London Underground, Docklands Light Railway, Croydon Tramlink within the London Fare Zones Area. Travelcard Season Tickets are also valid on most London Bus services throughout the London Bus network. For journeys starting outside the London Fare Zones Area, the Travelcard Season Ticket allows travel by train between the starting station and the London Fares Zones Area boundary, and then unlimited travel within the zones paid for.

The NRCoC is silent on the matter - only specifying that zonal tickets are valid on any train within the zone(s) covered. Nothing that I can see in the Routeing Guide either.

The difficulty seems to boil down to the nature of the Travelcard. Is it:
a) A ticket with a point origin and zonal destination, or
b) A point-to-point ticket with London Group as the destination, plus validity within Z1-6, or
c) Something else

The quote from the National Rail site suggests (a), in which case we are left with the question of how to determine routes to a zonal destination A reasonably sensible answer would be the shortest and/or direct routes but it doesn't seem to be documented anywhere (at least, nowhere accessible) - also I expect someone could find an example where a longer route is valid.