Cross Country weekend 1st

[SwindonBert]

Is there anywhere that shows the cost of weekend 1st on cross country trains? I'm planning to go from Cheltenham to York on a Saturday.

I've looked on the website but couldn't find it, cf GWR who show the cost clearly

 

[Romilly]

The page on their website called Weekend-upgrade mentions that you can include the upgrade when buying tickets on their website so, although you already have your ticket and will be buying the upgrade onboard on the day, maybe the thing to do is look for a ticket the same as yours on their website and then click on "upgr" to see what the difference in price is.

 

[Ash Bridge]

First Class upgrade is £15 each way.

 

[221129]

First Class upgrade is £15 each way.

For that specific journey yes

 

[Paul Kelly]

Look up the journey on www.brfares.com - under the section Walk-Up Fares – First Class you should see a single fare with a ticket type of IXC WEEKEND UPG - the price of that is what you'll pay.

 

[John @ home]

Is there anywhere that shows the cost of weekend 1st on cross country trains?

Yes. It is available on brfares.com as ticket type "IXC WEEKEND UPGRADE". Examples are:

• IXC WEEKEND UPGRADE PENZANCE - ABERDEEN Route XC ONLY £20.
• IXC WEEKEND UPGRADE CHELTENHAM SPA - YORK Route XC ONLY £15.
• IXC WEEKEND UPGRADE CHELTENHAM SPA - BURTON ON TRENT Route XC ONLY £10
  
• IXC WEEKEND UPGRADE CHELTENHAM SPA - BRISTOL PARKWAY Route XC ONLY £5.

 

[kingofmemphis4]

Hi @Indigo2 having issues as well with brfares. it appears that brfares is returning fares that other planners aren't returning. Sent an email but not sure the brfares inbox is being monitored. For example:

WGN to DUN

Is returning "SVH", "OFF-PEAK S" - 39.75 for an Adult fare. However, this doesn't appear on any other websites - Trainline, etc. How come it appears here?

Thanks.

 

[bb21]

"Saver Half" fares are only sold in conjunction with a single fare in the opposite direction as part of a return journey.

For a single journey, the fare is £69.

 

[Bletchleyite]

"Saver Half" fares are only sold in conjunction with a single fare in the opposite direction as part of a return journey.

For a single journey, the fare is £69.

Indeed. FWIW it sometimes makes sense to buy and bin a cheap Advance in conjunction with it, this can be cheaper than buying a full priced single. On the WCML, if WMT Only Advances are available (or even their walk-up singles) this can be a good way of doing it.

 

[kingofmemphis4]

"Saver Half" fares are only sold in conjunction with a single fare in the opposite direction as part of a return journey.

For a single journey, the fare is £69.

AH yes that makes sense. Thanks.

How can one identify the half saver fares? Is the ticket code (for example SVH) a good way to do this?

Is there a master list of what codes constitute a "Saver half fare". For example, I believe SSU is another one?

 

[kieron]

Look up the journey on www.brfares.com - under the section Walk-Up Fares – First Class you should see a single fare with a ticket type of IXC WEEKEND UPG - the price of that is what you'll pay.

It's odd that there are no route restrictions on the ticket (beyond "only on Crosscountry trains", of course), but fares are only published for routes which have Crosscountry-only advance tickets defined.

This means that, for instance, you can't buy a first class upgrade from Crewe to Southampton in advance to use on the one XC train a day which goes that way. Or (for other reasons) an upgrade for a Newport-Cardiff journey.

 

[causton]

It's odd that there are no route restrictions on the ticket (beyond "only on Crosscountry trains", of course), but fares are only published for routes which have Crosscountry-only advance tickets defined.

This means that, for instance, you can't buy a first class upgrade from Crewe to Southampton in advance to use on the one XC train a day which goes that way. Or (for other reasons) an upgrade for a Newport-Cardiff journey.

London Midland did/West Midlands Trains does work the same way. For example, none show for Watford Jn - Milton Keynes - maybe unlikely someone will upgrade for that short a distance but still!

 

[Wallsendmag]

AH yes that makes sense. Thanks.

How can one identify the half saver fares? Is the ticket code (for example SVH) a good way to do this?

Is there a master list of what codes constitute a "Saver half fare". For example, I believe SSU is another one?

Super Offpeak half as is SSH

 

[causton]

Super Offpeak half as is SSH

Both, actually. On BRFares SSU and SSH both come up. And one of them (I forget which one) comes up on Tribute TIS system but is 'greyed out' the other one is just not there, like the SVH, not shown at all.

 

[NSEFAN]

On the subject of weekend first on XC, I was once using split standard tickets, but the train was busy and it was a Saturday, so I wanted to upgrade to first. However I was told by the XC guard that I had to pay for a weekend first upgrade for each leg of the split ticket, rather than the through journey. Given this would be more expensive than with a normal upgrade, I opted to go back to standard. I wasn't previously aware of this policy, so was the guard correct or not?

 

[robbeech]

I don’t think there is a clear answer for this. You could see both sides of the argument. I have never had an issue with this but some guards clearly take this view. Are there any rules defining it, I assume they’d be TOC specific.

 

[221129]

On the subject of weekend first on XC, I was once using split standard tickets, but the train was busy and it was a Saturday, so I wanted to upgrade to first. However I was told by the XC guard that I had to pay for a weekend first upgrade for each leg of the split ticket, rather than the through journey. Given this would be more expensive than with a normal upgrade, I opted to go back to standard. I wasn't previously aware of this policy, so was the guard correct or not?

I believe this to be the technically correct answer but most would only do the one upgrade for your journey.

 

[yorkie]

On the subject of weekend first on XC, I was once using split standard tickets, but the train was busy and it was a Saturday, so I wanted to upgrade to first. However I was told by the XC guard that I had to pay for a weekend first upgrade for each leg of the split ticket, rather than the through journey. Given this would be more expensive than with a normal upgrade, I opted to go back to standard. I wasn't previously aware of this policy, so was the guard correct or not?

There are hardly any Guards that do this.

Whether it is lawful or not, I do not know, but it is one of XC's rather anti-passenger policies that no other TOC has, so the Guards can do this if they want to.

I would certainly be doing as you did, and moving back to Standard, if it happened to me.

In every occasion when I or anyone else travelling with me has asked for an upgrade, it has been the through upgrade, even when that is more expensive than splitting.

 

[kingofmemphis4]

Both, actually. On BRFares SSU and SSH both come up. And one of them (I forget which one) comes up on Tribute TIS system but is 'greyed out' the other one is just not there, like the SVH, not shown at all.

Yes its quite odd. Appears to be quite inconsistent. Is there is a definitive list for the half fare codes? C'mon experts... whats the answer here?

 

[alistairlees]

Yes its quite odd. Appears to be quite inconsistent. Is there is a definitive list for the half fare codes? C'mon experts... whats the answer here?

I think I've answered this in another thread somewhere.

Anyway, the answer (to the best of my knowledge) is:

SVH on Virgin Trains
SSH and SSU on Virgin Trains East Coast (both are in the data, I don't think *think* there are any differences in the data, though I have not checked)
SS2 on EMT

The SVH and SSH / SSU are half the price* of the SVR and SSR respectively. The SS2 is a bit more than half the price of the SSR.

I don't know of any others. I don't think there's a first class one.



*Unless you buy from the VTEC website of course!

 

[Starmill]

I think I've answered this in another thread somewhere.

Anyway, the answer (to the best of my knowledge) is:

SVH on Virgin Trains
SSH and SSU on Virgin Trains East Coast (both are in the data, I don't think *think* there are any differences in the data, though I have not checked)
SS2 on EMT

The SVH and SSH / SSU are half the price* of the SVR and SSR respectively. The SS2 is a bit more than half the price of the SSR.

VT do use SSH too, for the limited number of flows where they have Super Off-Peak tickets available. So they have, correspondingly:
Off Peak Reuturn [SVR] Super Off Peak Return [SSR]
Off Peak Single [SVS] Super Off Peak Single [SSS]
Off Peak Single (Online) [SVH] Super Off Peak Single (Online) [SSH]

Nice and easy...

 

[Wallsendmag]

Yes its quite odd. Appears to be quite inconsistent. Is there is a definitive list for the half fare codes? C'mon experts... whats the answer here?

Different ticket types so that different websites can handle them SVS,SSH,SSU

 

[SwindonBert]

Thanks for the advice

 

[alistairlees]

Different ticket types so that different websites can handle them SVS,SSH,SSU

I meant to ask earlier: why do you think different websites need different fares? And what are the differences between SSH and SSU (at a quick glance they seem identical) to achieve this? Oh, and for which websites? Thanks!

 

[Wallsendmag]

I meant to ask earlier: why do you think different websites need different fares? And what are the differences between SSH and SSU (at a quick glance they seem identical) to achieve this? Oh, and for which websites? Thanks!

A major third party retailer can't handle one of them so there is a duplicate which is slightly different behind the scenes.