Helen Deborah Vecht wrote:

Where I live, the ticket office closes at lunchtime. This now makes it
impossible to buy an OPODTC with Y-P.

Aren't they available at the machine/interchange/destination?

They're not available at the machine, AFAICT.

Ouch. The ones here still do them - but are located in the part of the
station that gets sealed when it's unstaffed.

Plus there's no longer a guarantee that my destination station will have
an
open ticket office, and it's not particularly progressive to have me
alight
mid-journey at a "known good" station to exchange my ticket.

What about a Permit to Travel? If you carry that and exchange it at the
first opportunity it should be okay.

I know it's a total pain, but can you buy your discounted ticket in
advance from that ticket office?

From recollection train companies hate to issue discounted weekday OPODTCs
in advance because the restricted use times get abused.