Why are train fares all over the shop?!

[Miljea]

I don't get it.

I use Trainline to check fares, My first question is: does the fare change each time you go back on the site, like say, Ryanair's do as the cookie tells them you're interested, so the price goes up? Or, once published, are they 'fixed'?

We normally book a day or so beforehand (it's for a DC at a nearish uni to come home for weekends if he wants). The earliest train we'd look at is 8pm on Friday, sometimes late morning Saturday, then back to uni 8pm on Monday.

But the fares can be £2.40 one way, to £12.40 one way. But even then, it'll go 9am train £2.40, then hourly- £2.40, £9,35, £2.40, £7.22.

None of these journey could really be considered rush hour!

What algorithm is at work?

It's not as if anyone browses the site and goes "Oh! That trainfare is only £2.40! I'll definitely get that! Even though I have no reason whatsoever to visit that place!'

You don't tend to impulse buy trainfares, do you?

Curious.

Anyone?

No idea but I'd love to know as well. At work, we did an incognito browser test and fares someone had been looking at went back down.

I commute a lot from work on train and really it makes no sense.
If your DC comes on train a lot might be worth checking out some kind of railcard like the young persons railcard for money off.

I would think it's to stagger the customers. So cheaper fares attract passengers whose priority is price.

I only ever book in advance so always get good deals.

My DD has a 18-25 rail card, which saves money.

Oh, my DC has a18-25 railcard; the fares I've cited are with that.

xtinak was that on Trainline?

It can, not always, weed out the “leisurely travellers” who just want to pop over to x for the day.. so they check and go at say 11 instead of 12 because it’s cheaper. Sometimes the more expensive trains also run either an express or different route, for us the train that comes from furthest away is more expensive than the one that starts one or two stops before.. but ironically the jumps in fares are less. Probably minimises the number of oh we could get the train to x and then bid on to y for half the price.

Commuter trains always get stupid prices, they know you need to be there by x. Sometimes it doesn’t seem like a commuter time but it could be further back or along the line.. or the company themselves record a high level of traffic at that time so bump it up.

An aside, an example from deep in the past, 1979 or 1980.

To get home to Hampshire from my chambermaiding jobs in Bavaria, long pre-Ryanair, you'd get The Boat Train.

We'd get on in the evening in Munich or Ulm,, travel through the night in a makeshift sleeper, be awoken by German border guards who missed the audition for Hans in Sound of Music 😉around dawn, then as we headed towards Ostend, the train would fill will Belgian commuters, all wet and flappy newspapers, deeply resentful at having to sit on a train, for 20 minutes, that started in Iron Curtain Prague, a day earlier. Sitting among the dishevelled detritus of long distance travellers.

I wonder what our 'per mile' price differentials were?