London to Norwich promotional fare availability

[lightbulb]

Hello all,

On behalf of a friend who rarely travels by train, I'm looking for the cheapest fare between Elstree & Borehamwood to Norwich. Checking the Liverpool Street to Norwich fares on BRFares, I see a return fare for £20 listed as NX2 GA PROMOTION:

http://www.brfares.com/#expert?orig=LST&dest=NRW

This would be ideal for my friend, as she wants to take the 0855 from LST on Saturday 22nd June, and leave the return open (returning the same day). However, ticket office staff at LST know nothing about it, suggesting it can only be sold online, but checking the Greater Anglia website, only the £10 advance singles appear.

Can anyone advise where this ticket may be purchased?

 

[ForTheLoveOf]

It appears these are promotional fares which are only offered at the discretion of GA. There is a post here from about a year and a half ago which discusses the fares.

Unfortunately it seems they are no longer selling them as I can't find any reference to them on Greater Anglia's website (and the link provided now gives an 'access denied' error page).

Advance tickets are likely to be the cheapest option. The nearest option to having a flexible ticket with these is to book them through a website like CrossCountry, which permits you to change Advance tickets, without the usual administration fee, to any other type of ticket prior to the departure of the booked service. This means that you can select a nominal service and then change your ticket if it looks like you won't be getting this any more.

This works best when opting for e-tickets since you are instantly charged and refunded for the new and old tickets, respectively, and it avoids the cost and time penalty of posting back the old tickets like you have to do if you choose paper tickets. E-tickets are issued as PDFs, so they can be printed so as to be as reliable as paper tickets.

Unfortunately there's no perfect solution, so it's a question of choosing the next best option. You might like to use a website like www.trainsplit.com to see what cheaper combination of tickets are available, seeing as there may be a fair saving to be made if travelling there and back on the same day (to avoid the 'penalty' that the flexibility of an "open return" offers).