Rail cards

[LittleEsme]

Are they always worth it?
DH and I had a couples railcard and save about £80 on a weekend travel from Wales to London return.

I'm travelling alone next month (cannot use the couples card) so have looked into prices. I'm apparently eligible to a Network Rail card (£30) but this only give me a £7 discount over all. Are they always worth getting?

I know it's probably a saving if you're a regular rail traveller, but DH and I saved quite a slice off one journey in the summer, I thought I would again. Doesn't seem worth it! Am I searching incorrectly?

Well it s 30 % usually so your ticket price if 7£ off must be 3 x7...
If you going to travel 5x then 5x7 is 35 so you will recoup the cost

If you have Tesco clubcard vouchers, you can buy a railcard with them

You are right they are only really beneficial when you travel regularly. I have a disabled railcard and it has saved me hundreds of pounds but I use the train every other month to travel the length of the uk. If it's just a one off saving of £7 I don't think I would bother.

It doesn't seem to include the network railcard

Network Railcard only covers the south east of England so would be highly unlikely to cover the cost of the card with the saving on one journey. Only really beneficial to regular users.

That used to be the case with most railcards until the Two Together card and the ridiculous situation whereby two people can reduce the price of just one long distance train journey by buying that railcard, an option that isn't available to lone travellers. And I'm not at all bitter about it 😡😡😡

Yep I generally think they are. I have a local rail card which I use quite regularly at weekends and it knocks off quite a bit on the tickets. We also did a longer haul day trip to London recently and the ticket office lady did a comparison of tickets with and without a national Railcard and the savings on the tickets more than paid off the Railcard so I now have two different Railcards ha.