London to Liverpool via Manchester

[hick]

Hi everyone,

I realise this subject has been done before, but I'd just like to check that nothing has changed as I'll be telling 10 people to do this.

We're looking to leave Euston Friday afternoon/evening travelling to Manchester, then on to Liverpool Saturday morning and returning from Liverpool to Euston on Sunday.

From what I think I know, we can all get young person off peak returns EUS to Liverpool, breaking the journey in Manchester on the Friday, resuming before 12:00 on Saturday and then returning home Sunday for £51 a pop. Am I right?

Also another friend is coming from Southampton likely on an off peak return. Can he similarly buy a ticket to Liverpool and then break and resume as we can?

Thanks!

 

[kieron]

London-Liverpool is valid via Manchester and Earlestown on MA+ML, and via Manchester and Warrington on MA+NL.

Southampton-Liverpool is valid via the same routes as London-Liverpool if you go via London. On a Not London ticket, you can use WX+MA+ML and WX+MA+NL via Farnborough, Clapham Junction and Willesden Junction. I haven't checked how convenient this would be, though.

Incidentally, I'd ask for London-Birkenhead Hamilton Square rather than London-Liverpool, as the off-peak return is 5p cheaper (10p without discount), it has the same validity as a Liverpool ticket, and it's an obvious route to take. Southampton-Liverpool is cheaper than Southampton-Birkenhead via London, the same price for Not London.

The tricky part of your proposal is travelling from Manchester to Liverpool on the day after the one on your outbound ticket. I'd rather travel on the return part and explain why I'm on a valid route than travel on the outbound one and explain why I couldn't finish the journey on one day. That could just be me, though.

 

[jkdd77]

Incidentally, I'd ask for London-Birkenhead Hamilton Square rather than London-Liverpool, as the off-peak return is 5p cheaper (10p without discount), it has the same validity as a Liverpool ticket, and it's an obvious route to take. Southampton-Liverpool is cheaper than Southampton-Birkenhead via London, the same price for Not London.

Kensington Olympia- Liverpool is cheaper still (A SVR is £49.95 per person with railcard discount).

I'll let other advise on the question of the overnight BoJ.

 

[hick]

I remember specifically looking up the validity in the past and it said break of journey allowed if resumed before 12:00. I've looked it up in brfares, but all I can see is break of journey allowed with ticket type except where explicitly stated.

As for buying to other destinations like Birkenhead and Kensington Olympia, technically the easement applies where all travel is on virgin trains. Booking engines and ticket offices won't sell tickets that travel in to the Merseyrail network with the easement despite it being off peak when actually using the other operators trains. I'm not sure how closely on board Virgin staff follow this though....

Technically there'd be the same problem with the Liverpool ticket as the travel between Manchester and Liverpool wouldn't be with Virgin. However if the TM said anything then you could say you'd changed your mind about your destination. Seems like an unneccesary restriction as far as I can see, it just adds hassle!