Wednesday 24 October 2012

An Ode To British Rail

Dear British Rail

Thank you so much for providing a website to book train tickets.

After traversing your website this week in search of a tickets from Staffordshire to Kent for the weekend I wanted to thank you for providing the most confusing information.

It has been a joy to research my limited option for travelling with you. I have been filled with wonder and awe at your varied tickets offers and have been happy to discover that I can pay £100s given the choice for a 175m journey.

It is a shame that with my limited education of only having a degree that I was unable to fathom off peak hours and I think it was wonderful to engage in a 25min hunt around your online pages to discover an explanation.

However it did mean I was then in the position to be able to ring your 10p / minute information line and spend the first 3minutes on a recorded menu. It is always so much more exciting to speak to a computer and engage in a lottery of button pushing to speak to an operator.

My favourite part was the 1 minute I spent saying no to the option of providing feedback at the end of the call, before I had even reached my required destination of speaking to a living breathing human.

The conclusion to this protracted investigation was visiting my local train station and buying a ticket from a charming gentleman for the princely sum of £59.30. More than a tank of petrol for my little POLO, and confirming my journey will entail 3 changes of trains, including a charming trip of 2 stations on the underground with my luggage.

What a thrifty, convenient way to travel.
Frugally yours
Abigail
x

2 comments:

  1. We travelled to Nottingham a couple of weekends ago to view a uni with KL. The cost for 3 adults to travel on the train? £148.30. That was before we had added in the busfare to get us into town to get to the train station, the £10.50 charge to get from Nottingham city centre to the Clifton campus, and then the bus fares back home again after we got off the train. The cost in the car? £35 And they wonder why more people don't use public transport!

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  2. So true - I spent an hour getting the lowest off-peak fares and found I could buy them for the three of us at the station for the same price. When I got to the station I was told I could get three for the price of two - very nice but NOWHERE on the website was that information posted - complete duck-shoot. Same with airline tickets, car hire etc.

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I really love reading all comments. So please tell me what you think. Abigail