Just how ridiculous are rail fares?

[planecrazi3778]

Originally Posted by geoffa

Really not worth forking out for a card that is going to discount one journey and she would never use again.

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I did think this, however when I looked into it, I managed to buy the rail card for £25 and saved £80 on a first class fare from the east Midlands to St Pancras. It cost us £64 return for 2 in 1st class. Was definitely worth getting the rail card.

[chippyminton]

Did you know that Tesco Clubcard points can be used to buy railcards?

We always have a family and friends, and a two together railcard. Also a group save ticket is often available if you travel with 3 others. The worst scenario is to be a solo passenger

[daytonababe]

I don’t use the train much but Chloe and I went to London yesterday and paid £44.80 return from Peterborough which I didn’t think was too bad as I didn’t book till Wednesday . Cost me a £14.50 to park all day at the station though!

4 of us went on a Sunday before Christmas booked the night before and paid £56.

Have to choose trains carefully though yesterday we went on the cheapest at 9.19 and came back at 7.52pm, some earlier / later trains were two/ three times the price

[Warkman58]

Originally Posted by Kidd McFluff

It’s expensive because private companies need to make increased profits each year. Some of our trains are run by European national railway companies so we are subsidising rail prices in Europe. Bring them all back into national control and either prices will come down or profits can be used to subsidise other public services. At the moment we’re paying through the nose and the government are taking over allowing them out of contract when they can’t make enough profits.

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Yes, let’s make the taxpayer fork out for those who use it every day.
Privatisation costs, it’s not free, the taxpayer ends up oaying a lot more for the same inadequate service, which when it overspends, gets the taxpayer to cover its costs.
The Government doesn’t have any money, it’s the people’s money

[lottiesmum0]

Originally Posted by chippyminton

Did you know that Tesco Clubcard points can be used to buy railcards?

We always have a family and friends, and a two together railcard. Also a group save ticket is often available if you travel with 3 others. The worst scenario is to be a solo passenger

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I did not know this- thankyou! I will be using our vouchers to buy a rail card!

[ChrisS]

Tesco Clubcard Points can also be converted into a Red Spotted Hanky e-voucher at X2 face value. When Tesco recently changed their Clubcard program it increased to X3, I was getting ready to buy when Tesco responded to the huge kick off about their changes and rescinded, so RSH is back to 2X. Red Spotted Hanky charge a £1 booking fee per booking, not per person. Unless I'm using Clubcard points I book via TPE as there's no booking fee plus 1st Class postage is free too.

[JudyC]

We must be fortunate as I manage to get some reasonable rail fares. Booked Runcorn to London return tickets for myself and son in a couple of weeks, as he had a medical appointment. Was £37 each return with his disability rail card. That's leaving a 7:15am (an hour later and the price jumps up a lot) and returning 9pm (again if we came back a bit earlier it's a lot more) Had reasonable fares to York and Edinburgh as well. It seems to be the luck of the draw depending where you live.