It's about to get easier to buy cheap UK train tickets - here's how
A trial, starting in May on selected routes - including CrossCountry, Virgin Trains' east and west coast services and East Midlands - will make the cheapest route options easier to buy by removing longer, more complicated journey options.
Single-leg pricing will also be introduced on some journeys, giving passengers the option of booking two single tickets instead of a return, which can often be cheaper.
The trial will mean:
- Each route will be overhauled, removing older, less relevant routes from the system to make choice clearer.
- On journeys where customers change trains, a "best value end-to-end 'through fare' will be offered" with one price combining the cheapest fare for each leg of the journey.
- Regulations around return fares, which have existed since the 1980s and were introduced before online bookings, will be changed. Currently, operators face regulations that force them to set and maintain a through price on tickets, even when there are cheaper deals, preventing them from being more flexible.
- Journey planning will be made easier by allowing customers to mix and match the best fare when seeing the best price in each direction, much like with airline bookings.
- Ticketing machines will be made more user-friendly, including getting rid of jargon.
Passengers on trains between London and Sheffield or Scotland will be the first to benefit.
Jacqueline Starr, director of customer experience at Rail Delivery Group, said: "There are more than 16 million different train fares, many of which nobody has ever bought. This also makes it more difficult to give passengers the right, simple options on ticket machines.
"Working with government, we are determined to overhaul the system to cut out red tape, jargon, and complication to make it easier for customers to buy fares they can trust, including from ticket machines."
The Guardian reported that Lianna Etkind, public transport campaigner at the Campaign for Better Transport, was pleased with the plans to simplify the "horribly complicated" fare systems. However, she also called for the introduction of "long overdue" part-time season tickets.