Excess Questions

[bb21]

It's 4.30 and I just woke up and had a simple excess/money-saving question in my head. I did a quick search on the forum but couldn't find anything. Here we go.

Say I want to travel one way Bramley-Waterloo on SWT. The SDS comes in at £11.75 Y-P. Can I just buy a Bramley-Basingstoke CDR at £1.65 and excess it on the train? Bramley-Waterloo CDR is £12.85 so I believe to excess one way it is half the difference between these two tickets, ie. (12.85 - 1.65) / 2 = £5.60. In this case I have only forked out a total of 1.65 + 5.60 = £7.25 instead of £11.75 for a one-way journey. Is my understanding correct? It seems too good to be true and i'm sure I have missed something here.

 

[First class]

I don't believe you can excess a single into a return once you've made the single journey. Reason being is that your ticket has been fully used and has no value in it.

 

[krus_aragon]

I don't believe you can excess a single into a return once you've made the single journey. Reason being is that your ticket has been fully used and has no value in it.

No, this is distance excessing a return on one leg only. I'm not sure enough of my facts to say whether it's doable or not.

 

[John @ home]

Is my understanding correct?

Sorry, no. An over-distance excess fare is charged at the full rate for the difference in return prices. It's an excess by route, where one leg is travelled by a cheaper route and the other by a more expensive one, that attracts an excess fare of only half the difference.

 

[bb21]

http://www.railforums.co.uk/showthread.php?t=31429

So does that not mean then the OP in the quoted case should have been excessed the difference between an undiscounted Stockport-Euston SVR - £65.70 - and Lancaster-Euston SVR - £73.20?

Being over-distance he should therefore be charged £7.50 for the excess than the £3.75 he actually paid? :roll:

 

[hairyhandedfool]

If you do it on-board the train and there was opportunity to change the ticket before boarding, you will either be excessed to the full return ticket or be sold a new ticket for the uncovered section of the journey (unless penalty fares rules apply).

If there was no opportunity before boarding or it is done at the ticket office a return ticket CAN be excessed in one direction only, if it is cheaper than the ticket to cover the extra journey.

 

[Mojo]

I'm pretty sure the machines half the price of a return to excess to a single, regardless of what it says anywhere else. Example recently I had a Filton Abbey Wood to Cardiff Bay SDR, discounted price £3.10. On the return leg I wanted to excess to Bristol Temple Meads and was charged 25p excess, I believe, calculated by the cost of a Bristol Temple Meads - Cardiff Bay SDR (£3.60), less what I have already paid (£3.10) and then halved to give me the 25p excess.

I don't know what the situation is where the price is different depending on which way round you buy the ticket (eg. many tickets are cheaper leaving London than heading towards London).

 

[mumrar]

Over distance and I think change of route excesses are the only ones where fare halving is allowed if changing one portion. If you want Std to 1st or a change of ticket type, it will always be the total difference between the two return fares, even if the change is only on one leg of a ticket.

 

[yorkie]

Over distance and I think change of route excesses are the only ones where fare halving is allowed if changing one portion. If you want Std to 1st or a change of ticket type, it will always be the total difference between the two return fares, even if the change is only on one leg of a ticket.

I believe this is correct.

The OP should note that SWT operate a penalty fares scheme and if the ticket office was open at the origin then a PF could, I think, be issued after the point where the ticket expires if you have not yet seen the guard. If ticket issuing facilities are not available at the origin but are available at the place where you would want to excess from, that was debated here but no concensus was reached. If ticket issuing facilities do not exist at either location then I don't see how there can be a problem obtaining a fully discounted excess on the train.