Cheap Train Ticketes...

[Gall1987]

Hi.

Does anyone know the best website to use to get cheap train tickets? Or would National Rail be the best bet?

Looking at travelling from Crewe to Bristol Parkway on the 6th of February.

Cheers for any help

 

[Gall1987]

www.thetrainline.co.uk

But as you're not booking 18 years in advance on the 6th Thursday of the month between 12.02 and 12.03 it'll still cost you a fortune.

Public transport ftl

I agree!

Cheers, I'll have a look

 

[Gall1987]

3 weeks in advance seems to get pretty cheap fares when I check...alternatively, take a coach.

Coach takes nearly 5 hours and cheapest is £26! Cheapest train I've find is £30 with a railcard, so I think that's the best I'll get.

 

[Gall1987]

Return?

National Rail shows £30 without a railcard (so £20 with the discount), tried that?

Yeh, I want a same day return.

Cheapest I've found on any of the mentioned sites is just under £30 with a railcard. £45 without a railcard! I think I may just go for that.

Does anyone know the latest that you can get an 'advance' ticket? I might be wrong but I think it's a week before?

 

[Gall1987]

No they don't.

The National Rail website will offer a choice of ALL ticket prices from all operators on the route and then give you a choice of ANY operator from which to buy the ticket at that price (you can for example buy a Penzance to London return on First Great Western from Scotrail if you wish).

The only thing you'll sometimes find at the operators own site is promotions such as FGW's current 10% off Advance Purchase fares - but you can still access this by using Nationalrail to find the prices and simply selecting your local operator to buy from when prompted, you cannot buy from Nationalrail themselves.

Never bother with thetrainline.com. You wont get a special deal and you WILL be charged a booking fee.

I take it your not charged a booking fee with The Train Line then? Seems a bit silly that people even use it then!