Possible to excess return half at St Pancras?

[amsutcliffe]

My wife and I need to travel from Bedford to St Pancras late Thursday morning, returning in the afternoon. There are cheap advances still available in the morning, but we need flexibility later so I don't think that helps us - it will be cheaper to buy a day return.

There's a good chance we'll be able to start our return before 4.30pm, so I'm tempted to buy Super Off Peak Day Returns (£27 before network railcard discount).

However, there's a possibility we'll be later. I understand that if we needed to travel after 4.30pm, I should be able to purchase excess tickets to 'upgrade' the Super Off Peak Day Returns to Off Peak Day Returns by paying the difference in price.

Is this correct in theory? If so, what are the chances of the St Pancras ticket office being able to do so easily and without complaint? Presumably it will be more straightforward with paper tickets than with e-tickets?



Thanks.

 

[Hadders]

Your theory is correct. The ticket office at St Pancras should be able to issue the excess but this sort thing is not commonly asked for and some staff lack knowledge or the ability to look up how to do things so expect top have to shop around to obtain it. There are two ticket offices at St Pancras - one operated by GTR, the other by EMR and just across the road at Kings Cross is one operated by LNER.

Paper ticket or eticket shouldn't make any difference.

 

[Haywain]

My wife and I need to travel from Bedford to St Pancras late Thursday morning, returning in the afternoon. There are cheap advances still available in the morning, but we need flexibility later so I don't think that helps us - it will be cheaper to buy a day return.

There's a good chance we'll be able to start our return before 4.30pm, so I'm tempted to buy Super Off Peak Day Returns (£27 before network railcard discount).

However, there's a possibility we'll be later. I understand that if we needed to travel after 4.30pm, I should be able to purchase excess tickets to 'upgrade' the Super Off Peak Day Returns to Off Peak Day Returns by paying the difference in price.

Is this correct in theory? If so, what are the chances of the St Pancras ticket office being able to do so easily and without complaint? Presumably it will be more straightforward with paper tickets than with e-tickets?



Thanks.

It won’t be a problem and the ticket offices at St Pancras will deal with these sort of excesses multiple times every day. I would be extremely surprised if you had to ‘shop around’ as suggested above.

 

[amsutcliffe]

Brilliant, thanks both.

 

[DeverseSam]

According to the guide on here, there’s no penalty for excessing on the train, so if the gateline staff / barrier doesn’t object, maybe that’s easier than queuing up.

 

[Deerfold]

According to the guide on here, there’s no penalty for excessing on the train, so if the gateline staff / barrier doesn’t object, maybe that’s easier than queuing up.

There are not often staff on the local trains and you may not see a guard on the short journey on the EMR trains.

 

[Haywain]

According to the guide on here, there’s no penalty for excessing on the train, so if the gateline staff / barrier doesn’t object, maybe that’s easier than queuing up.

The barrier at St Pancras will certainly object.

 

[Hadders]

There is no penalty for purchasing board (and I have personally witnessed GTR RPIs correctly charging an excess during ticket checks), but some TOCs have also been known to issue Penalty Fares for travelling at a barred time.

The NRCoT contradicting itself on this doesn’t help.

For a hassle free journey I would purchase the excess before travel.

 

[Bletchleyite]

There is no penalty for purchasing board (and I have personally witnessed GTR RPIs correctly charging an excess during ticket checks), but some TOCs have also been known to issue Penalty Fares for travelling at a barred time.

The NRCoT contradicting itself on this doesn’t help.

For a hassle free journey I would purchase the excess before travel.

I'd add that unlike route excesses (which can be a nightmare) London terminals are very well used to simple Super Off Peak->Off Peak(->Anytime) excesses, so I wouldn't expect St Pancras booking office to have any issues at all doing this.

I've had one from Euston before.

 

[DeverseSam]

some TOCs have also been known to issue Penalty Fares for travelling at a barred time.

Thank you, that’s useful to know, I don’t think many have found their way onto this site yet

 

[mrmartin]

Do you have to pay the full difference or just half for the return portion?

 

[30907]

Do you have to pay the full difference or just half for the return portion?

The full difference for the full benefit

 

[Bletchleyite]

Do you have to pay the full difference or just half for the return portion?

For a ticket type excess it's the full difference I'm afraid. Only change of route (and I think class?) are half.