Avanti West Coast has extended its low cost Superfare ticket to ten more destinations in the North West, includng Wilmslow, following a successful initial trial.
The Superfare ticket, which enables customers to book a journey for a specific date with the choice of morning, afternoon, or evening slots at a cheaper fare – with the exact time of travel being selected by the intercity operator – can now be purchased for journeys between London and Stafford, Stoke-on-Trent, Crewe, Macclesfield, Wilmslow, Stockport, Runcorn, Wigan North Western, Warrington Bank Quay and Lancaster.
With around 24 hours' notice, Avanti West Coast will match customers to an empty seat on a quieter train and advise them of their reservation details and train's departure time.
The new Superfare tickets will go on sale from 25 July 2023 for travel from 1 August 2023, with prices set at fixed amounts - the one-way fare between London and Wilmslow is £18.
The number of tickets available on a route each day will vary and bookings can be made at least seven days and up to 21 days before travel.
Sarah Copley, Commercial Director at Avanti West Coast said: "Our customers have really taken to the new Superfare ticket. It's innovative, low cost and most importantly encouraging more people to take the train, so we're delighted to extend the Superfare ticket benefits to ten new destinations."
Comments
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The answer is, it does not - these discounted tickets will only be available to those booking on line.
In fact, even if the ticket offices remain open, these will not be available to a walk up traveller.
We are in danger of creating a population of the “digitally disenfranchised”.
I am all for innovation but we have to carry everyone along and make sure the “vulnerable” get the same option for savings as everyone else.
A leading rail ticket retailer quotes there are 2,822 ticket types with 901 unique ticket names, 655 restriction codes and 1,288 route codes in the rail ticketing system and this complexity has only got worse since Covid as Train Operating Companies have introduced even more ticket types. Far from all of these are available on line or from ticket machines. Before even contemplating abolishing ticket offices the rail ticketing system should be greatly simplified to be easily understandable by non-experts and every ticket type (not just the more expensive ones) readily available on line or at a machine.
As an example of trying to book tickets on-line for about as simple a simple a journey one can imagine, here's a recent personal experience. I wanted to book two Advance Standard Return tickets for my wife and myself, Wilmslow to Euston. Whichever way I tried re-configuring our seating requirements on the on-line form, the tickets offered were ALWAYS for seats with no window view (there are quite a lot of such seats on Pendolinos, and I suspect the on-line ticketing software is deliberately written to sell those to the cheapest tickets sold on line - standard class Advanced). A trip to Wilmslow station booking office got me the tickets I wanted at the price I wanted and with a window view.
It's madness that for instance Glossop will retain its booking office, while Manchester Piccadilly, London Euston, and Birmingham New St will not. And where and when will these (I believe) mythical wandering ticket helpers, displaced from their booking office, be found? Not all stations have concourses for them to stand outside their boarded-up ticket office, and all booking offices have published opening hours when you know you can go there and buy a ticket.
It is yet another example of this government making train travel more difficult and less pleasant (along with uncomfortable new trains and deletion of on-board catering), driving them to use their cars instead, the exact opposite of what they should be doing if we are to meet carbon targets.
Here's an informative article on the booking office fiasco from 'Bus & Train User'.
https://busandtrainuser.com/2023/07/08/ticket-office-closure-con/