Railway Freebie Stories

[adrock1976]

My notable freebie in recent years was a free of charge First Class return from Virgin West Coast.

I received the email during January 2008 as a result of the engineering works fiasco at Rugby during the festive period of 2007. I had booked a Standard Class Advance from Birmingham NS to London a few months previous, which was lees than £10 at the time.

My free First Class return (technically Advance Singles, as you could only use it on the booked train) was redeemed for a Glasgow - London trip for one of my meetings there. On the southbound journey, I had 2 lots of breakfast - the first after departing Glasgow, with the second after departing Preston. The evening meal I had 2 servings either side of Preston on the northbound journey. I cannot remember if I was offered any "liquid lunches" or not.

 

[philthetube]

I get a free ride from Harrow on the Hill to Gt. Missenden and return every Saturday.

No facilities to buy a Northbound ticket and no office open on the south and as a priv holder no option to pay by machine.

 

[sciisfun]

My bests must be:
A massive box of wessex promotional goods, posters and timetables, and such, as well as mouse mats (who remembers those XD)
Multiple free first class upgrades at busy times with XC and GWR for looking the part
Preferential service in first class (including three hot breakfast wraps on a journey lasting just over an hour with XC) again, for looking 'the part', full suit, mac ect
and although it doesn't really count, my great uncle's BR driver hat

 

[Thebaz]

When I was 16 (1994) I did work experience in the Network SouthCentral timetabling department. As part of my experience I got a cab ride on a weedkilling train between Redhill and Tonbridge and back to East Croydon. I doubt this would happen now.

I was also told I was being given some 'homework' one evening. This turned out to be choosing my route for be a free pass to anywhere on the rail network for any time of my choosing! IIRC My dad and I went Kings X - Leeds - Settle & Carlisle - stayed overnight in Carlisle then Carlisle - Newcastle - Donny - Sheffield - St Pancras. I really wanted to go to the far north but my dad wasn't that keen a traveller!

 

[KingDaveRa]

I got £1000 from Chiltern Railways...

Yes really! Idly browsing Twitter some time ago, (right in the early days, early 2010) and saw a link saying they were running a survey about their service, and there was a draw for winning £1000. Randomly got an email a few weeks later saying I'd won.

I went down to Aylesbury station and did some photos with them waving a wad of 20s in front of the station sign.

So yeah, as freebies go, that was a good one.

 

[Deepgreen]

Until about 15 years ago, there was a little-known reciprocal agreement between London Transport (as was) and Commonwealth country transport networks for free travel. My wife and I did the trans-Canadian rail journey from Halifax to Vancouver, including sleepers (with several stopovers), first class..for nothing, in 1999. C$6,600 equivalent.

A colleague of mine had done a similar journey around the same time but had not been aware of the perk and paid his way!

What I could never fathom was what wonderful benefits the Canadians might expect from us - free travel to Chesham?!

 

[cuccir]

I think the last two posts have certainly topped the rest for value!