How can I buy this SSU ticket?

[JoeM1V]

I'm booking a round trip from London Terminals to Nottingham for the 16th of November. Engineering work means the only (non replacement-bus) option is LNER to Grantham, then EMR.

I want to get an advance for the outbound, then a Super Off Peak Single (restriction 9D) for the return. A normal Super Off Peak single routed Via Grantham is £63.60, but BRFares shows an SSU ticket for £32.30. I know this is a special ticket type meant to be sold only in conjunction with an advance in the other direction.

My problem is that I can't get any booking engine (tried LNER, Virgin, Trainline so far) to sell me the SSU - either I get offered an off-peak return, or an advance + the full price SSS single.

Is this ticket not available, or am I doing something wrong?

 

[yorkie]

What times are you travelling?

I got an itinerary on Trainsplit departing 0833 with an Advance to Nottingham for £19.70 and a SSU back departing 1845.

To get this I had to exclude GTR services using Advanced mode; you will only get an SSU if the itinerary includes LNER. You can take any operator though.

 

[JoeM1V]

What times are you travelling?

I got an itinerary on Trainsplit departing 0833 with an Advance to Nottingham for £19.70 and a SSU back departing 1845.

To get this I had to exclude GTR services using Advanced mode; you will only get an SSU if the itinerary includes LNER. You can take any operator though.

Thanks, this is exactly what I'm looking for.

How does one make Trainsplit give advances one way and flexible tickets the other? I can only find "Fixed Time" and "Flexible" options for the journey as a whole.

Also, is there any way to book a 1st class advance on the outbound using Trainsplit? Again this would be easy enough with LNER's interface, if I could just get them to sell the ticket...

 

[yorkie]

Thanks, this is exactly what I'm looking for.

How does one make Trainsplit give advances one way and flexible tickets the other? I can only find "Fixed Time" and "Flexible" options for the journey as a whole.

Use fixed time mode; the return journey has no Advances available, so you get the SSU.

Also, is there any way to book a 1st class advance on the outbound using Trainsplit? Again this would be easy enough with LNER's interface, if I could just get them to sell the ticket...

No, sadly not as there is no option on Trainsplit to request 1st in one direction only.

Trainline do sell these fares but they don't give you advanced options. As you say LNER's interface would allow it, if only it gave advanced options (though as an aside it's worth mentioning for anyone else in this situation that LNER doesn't give a Railcard discount on these fares, so anyone with a Railcard is better off booking with Trainline, Trainsplit or any of the other retailers who sell these fares, but not many retailers sell them)

I am not sure if SilverRail support these fares, but if they do, you could try to get a suitable itinerary on NRE, then choose to buy from a retailer that supports the fare and accepts the itinerary from NRE (if any do). Some retailers trust the itineraries produced by NRE and some do their own search when passed data from NRE.

But that could be a lot of hassle and it may not even work.

 

[JoeM1V]

I am not sure if SilverRail support these fares, but if they do, you could try to get a suitable itinerary on NRE, then choose to buy from a retailer that supports the fare and accepts the itinerary from NRE (if any do). Some retailers trust the itineraries produced by NRE and some do their own search when passed data from NRE.

Figured I ought to update this: National Rail Enquiries finds the fare (although it can't do a first class advance and a standard return, as far as I can tell). By default it passes over to LNER which errors out with "Fare Not Found", but CrossCountry seemed to accept it. Thanks again for all your help with this!