London Banter - View Single Post - SWT & NR - from deep alliance to deep something else

[email protected] · September 29th 17, 10:41 AM posted to uk.transport.london

In article , (Roland Perry)
wrote:

In message , at 13:12:13 on Thu,
28 Sep 2017, Martin Coffee remarked:
On 25/08/17 14:14, Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at 13:23:53 on
Fri, 25 Aug 2017, Richard remarked:
[Choice of Railcards on SWR]
This is an ongoing trend. When I had TfL u my senior card onto my
Oyster recently, the only option the hilariously mardy and untrained
roving chappie had to pick was "National Rail Cards". He insisted
they were all treated as one now when it came to validity (mainly
time of day, I suppose). I very much doubt that!

Are the discounts only on Oyster off-peak fares? I think they would
be all the same in that case.

Network cards are strictly "after 10am", whereas the Senior Railcard
is "off-peak {may vary locally}"[1], and the F&F/TTG/Disabled
Railcard is "After 9.30am".

With the exception that the Senior Railcard has identical morning
restrictions as the Network one for journeys wholly within the Network
area.

No!!! That's precisely the point I was making.

For example, from where I live (within the NSE area) the first trains
I can use a

Senior Card: depart 08:58, arr London 10:13 (1st opportunity to
arrive
after 10am)

Network Card: depart 10:07, arr London 11:32 (1st opportunity to
depart
after 10am)

in practice, one would get the next, and faster, train:

depart 10:25, arr London 11:35.

The Senior card has the same restriction as an Off-peak ticket,
whereas the Network Card is so restricted as to be useless for doing
anything in London before noon.

Roland is correct, if a bit Ely-centric. From Cambridge one can be at King's
Cross just after 11.

For nearly a decade I had a job in central London. It was only part time, 20
hours a week, so depended on getting cheap travel based on of-peak day
returns using Network Railcard discounts (and an ability to stay
occasionally with my parents in Putney to get an earlier start).

Later in the job I passed the age of 60 so was able to tell my boss in
advance that when I reached that age I would be able to get to work an hour
earlier because the first off-peak train reaches London just after 10.

--
Colin Rosenstiel