London Banter - View Single Post - Thameslink/FCC ticket validity question again

Arthur Figgis · March 4th 08, 05:46 PM posted to uk.transport.london

Colin Rosenstiel wrote:
In article
,
(Mizter T) wrote:

On 4 Mar, 01:02, (Colin Rosenstiel) wrote:

In article

,
(Mizter T) wrote:

On 3 Mar, 20:45, wrote:
IIRC, I bought a Saver Return ticket to Gatwick from the ticket
machine at KX Thameslink, which listed Gatwick and London
Terminals as my destinations. Going through the gates and
getting out to the airport was not a problem, but the return
was another story as the gates would not let me exit gates would
gates would not let me exit back at KX Thameslink.
One of the attendents then told me that the ticket was not good
as the destination was London Terminals, although he waved me
through.
So,
-- Why was I sold that ticket if there was going to be a problem
with my getting back? Was it actually me who purchased the wrong
ticket? If so, then what ticket should I have purchased?
Because the ticket machine was very badly programmed badly. Anyone
buying tickets at KX Thameslink for a trip to Gatwick quite
obviously wants to use Thameslink through central London to get
there. The ticket machine there shouldn't have even offered
anything else.
A properly issued ticket for that journey would have specified
Kings Cross Thameslink as the named station of origin station
(*not* London Terminals).
Isn't a St Pancras International-Gatwick ticket cheaper now as
well?
Cheaper than what?

For London to Gatwick journeys, FCC-only tickets are cheaper than
'Any Permitted' tickets (though not as cheaper {sic} as they used to
be). I suppose it would be possible for one to obtain a St Pancras
Int'l - Gatwick 'Any Permitted' ticket instead of an FCC-only one, if
you particularly wanted to travel down from London Bridge on the slow
Southern train!

However it is quite possible for one to obtain an FCC-only London
Terminals - Gatwick ticket - the same rules as detailed upthread
would apply, i.e. it would only be valid for journeys starting from
City
Thameslink and points south (Blackfriars, London Bridge) though you
would only be able to use it on FCC trains.

I was thinking of FCC-only tickets valid for that journey, as offered to
me for Cambridge-Brighton via London journeys.

Anyway, I had to go to City Thameslink today because that's where FCC
have hidden the lost property office we in Cambridge have to use now. It
would be too convenient for them to continue using the Cambridge lost
property office for GN route stuff, after all!

So I made a point of asking the Shere machine at Cambridge not for a
London Terminals day return but one to City Thameslink. It sold me one to
London Terminals anyway, at the usual price.

I asked at the Cambridge barriers whether the barriers at Kings Cross
would take the ticket. They thought they would.

When I got to King's Cross suburban I asked how I was supposed to get to
City Thameslink and they let me through the barrier manually. At St
Pancras International the barrier let me though with the ticket and at
City Thameslink (what a walk to the Holborn Viaduct exit!) the barrier
let me through and swallowed my ticket. So a lot of systems seem not to
agree with the fares manual!

I'd have got there a lot quicker by bike, mind.

Southern ticket offices have told me a couple of times in the past 3-4
months that Croydon/Sutton/etc to St Pancras (was KXTL) route Thameslink
tickets are no more, and a London Terminals ticket is now valid though
London by FCC. I queried it each time, but they said it was valid and it
worked the gates. Sutton/Croydon - London Terminals tickets always used
to work the gates at KXTL, though not Farringdon.

--
Arthur Figgis Surrey, UK