[Travel] Train Season Ticket

lost in london said:

Anyone else thinking about cancelling their season ticket and getting a refund?

My annual season ticket about about £3k started on 7 Jan, can't work out whether it's worth cancelling or holding onto it.

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Guinness Boy said:

Never been so glad to WFH. Because I switch between client sites, home and London I don't get an annual season ticket but the weekly one sets me back around £160 which I now have back in my pocket in case the job disappears. Just have to persuade the wife not to spend it on pasta now

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dazzer6666 said:

Same - saving £100/week+ for now.

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dazzer6666 said:

Same - saving £100/week+ for now.

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Brighton4Cambridge3 said:

Me too!

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Beach Hut said:

Presumably you travel to an office daily and are now WFH ?

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schmunk said:

I'm going to the station today to cancel my annual ticket. It cost ca. £4k and I've used just over 6 months so far.

As I understand it, they price up the tickets you could have bought instead and only refund the difference (rather than a pro-rata refund of the total cost) - for me that seems to be a £2,300 6-month ticket and a couple of £100 weekly tickets, so a £1,500 refund. I've worked out that I'll break even if I'm at home for at least a month and, given the schools are closing tomorrow, that seems pretty likely.

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lost in london said:

Correct, although i normally work from home a day a week.

I think they calculate the refund by dividing the total cost by 40 (you get 12 weeks free effectively with an annual ticket), that gives you a per week cost. They then count the number of weeks you have had the ticket for (just over ten for me) to work out the cost of the ticket used so far and give you the balance.

If that's right mine would be 3000 / 40 = £75 per week
10 weeks @ £75/week = £750
£3,000 - £750 = £2,250 refund.

One way I'm looking at it is to make a judgement whether i think I'm going to be WFH for all of the free 12 weeks, if not, then I can't see the benefit of getting a refund.

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Beach Hut said:

I would suspect, post this Corona Virus issue, a lot of companies will realise their staff do not need to attend an office every day as this enforced change will change many peoples working lives. Where I worked we had it enforced on us by hot desking introduced and we were told to WFH as the company spent a large amount of money on office space totally under utilised.

In view of this I would cash in as I suspect you will find your work methods will change ultimately.

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schmunk said:

I'm going to the station today to cancel my annual ticket. It cost ca. £4k and I've used just over 6 months so far.

As I understand it, they price up the tickets you could have bought instead and only refund the difference (rather than a pro-rata refund of the total cost) - for me that seems to be a £2,300 6-month ticket and a couple of £100 weekly tickets, so a £1,500 refund. I've worked out that I'll break even if I'm at home for at least a month and, given the schools are closing tomorrow, that seems pretty likely.

Click to expand...

lost in london said:

Correct, although i normally work from home a day a week.

I think they calculate the refund by dividing the total cost by 40 (you get 12 weeks free effectively with an annual ticket), that gives you a per week cost. They then count the number of weeks you have had the ticket for (just over ten for me) to work out the cost of the ticket used so far and give you the balance.

If that's right mine would be 3000 / 40 = £75 per week
10 weeks @ £75/week = £750
£3,000 - £750 = £2,250 refund.

One way I'm looking at it is to make a judgement whether i think I'm going to be WFH for all of the free 12 weeks, if not, then I can't see the benefit of getting a refund.

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schmunk said:

[Edit: sorry - I didn't see you'd already replied to my earlier post]


I'm not sure this is correct, presuming you're talking about a National Rail ticket.

My understanding (and backed up by my receiving pretty much the number I calculated) is that they'll look at how long you've held the ticket and then work out the next cheapest way for you to have had train travel for that period - i.e. the combination of shorter season tickets that covers your time. You are then refunded the balance of what you paid over this amount.

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Beach Hut said:

I would suspect, post this Corona Virus issue, a lot of companies will realise their staff do not need to attend an office every day as this enforced change will change many peoples working lives. Where I worked we had it enforced on us by hot desking introduced and we were told to WFH as the company spent a large amount of money on office space totally under utilised.

In view of this I would cash in as I suspect you will find your work methods will change ultimately.

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deletebeepbeepbeep said:

I am really at a loss to do with this because my ST is an annual which I renewed in February - if I end up not going to Crawley for the rest of the year it might be worth it.

But my girlfriend lives in London so not only does it cover my work journey it also makes it 'affordable' to see her on a weekly basis, i.e. a £10 travel card from Three Bridges versus a £20 travel card from Brighton (super off peak, £25 if off peak)

At the moment I am thinking of sitting on it for a month but obviously every day passed makes it less worthwhile. If I end up having to go to Three Bridges again by the end of July clearly it would not be worth it but if I am WFH now until next year it probably would be despite added cost of travel to London which I estimate would cost an additional £500 on what I would have spent anyway.

The train operators should offer an option to 'pause' the season ticket until you need it again.

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