Why am I so stupid? Train fares again

[jack]

It seems the fares the journey planner website displays are limited by the other journeys listed in the same query. As far as I can tell, return-off-peak and day-return-off-peak are valid on slightly different times of day, but there's no way to ask (either an English language terms-and-conditions, or a lookup query) which trains a certain ticket is valid on, the only option is to try those routes and see if a ticket with the same name is available or not.

I know I shouldn't be surprised any more, but I always feel so incredibly wool-headed when someone is yelling at me that I urgently need "foo" but they refuse to tell me anything about what foo is or what it costs.

Comments

[naath]

A non-day return is valid for returning tomorrow, or next week (I forget how long they are valid for). A "day return" of any kind is valid only *today*. There are non-off-peak return tickets ("Anytime" apparently); you should almost never need two singles.

If you don't know what time you will be finishing in London but need to get back at the latest on the 1815 then you should buy a peak ticket; if you could stand to wait for the 1845 buy the off-peak and wait. The peak trains are crowded anyway - also they (approximately) are no-bikes, so if you are travelling with a (non-folding) bike you probably don't want a peak time ticket.

If you go and ask at the ticket desk at the station you will get a plain English response to queries such as "what ticket do I need if I know I'm coming back at 1800" and "what about if I wait until 1900" and "is there a not-via-London ticket for this route?" and "do I need to book my bicycle for some/all/none of this trip" and similar things which apparently they find too hard to put online in easy-to-understand form.