Help! How do I know which Railcard to get?

[kittykittykitty5]

I am travelling to see lots of Unis with DS2 over the next 3 months. The majority of which we will be doing by train, others will be cheaper to do by car.

Do any of you have railcards? I can't work out which one is going to suit me best.

Many thanks.

Probably best just to get ds a young persons railcard - if 16+ family railcard doesn't apply.

I would have thought the two together one or what ever it is called.

Just checked. The two together gets you both 1/3 off, but you have to travel together. If DS is going to be travelling alone at all then a 16-25 one gets him 1/3 off.
They both cost £30 but there is a code for 10 or 20% off if you buy online. In my experience they arrive in a couple of days max providing you order beginning or mid week.

It all depends on how much flexibility you want him to have. Dad worked for a railway company when I was at uni and wouldn't let me get a card, he called them rip off cards because you could only use them off-peak and that was basically 11-7pm where we lived. Instead he got me in the habit of booking advance fares and often I'd end up paying a lot less than my friends even with their cards. It does depend on your route though and how many trains DS needs to catch. If it's a direct route then an advance fare may be cheaper.

fleur why didn't you have priv travel if your dad worked on the railways?

Whichever you buy always make sure you have it you when you travel. I left it in another bag last week and had to pay £20 extra.

You can use railcards to book advance fares too, making them even cheaper.

Young Person's railcards sometimes have different restrictions on hours than others - where I am, you can use a YP railcard on trains to London almost an hour earlier than you can the Network railcard, which makes a noticeable difference if you're trying to get down and back for an appointment or interview or something.

It's confusing isn't it?

I have been playing on the rail ticket websites with all the different railcards to make advanced ticket bookings. I have tried Annual Gold Card discount, Young Persons Railcard, Forces Railcard, Two Together and Friends and Family.

Now discovered TicketySplit which is just confusing things further.

They don't like to make it easy do they? We need a Mumsnet Discount Card Mumsnet HQ that gives us discount on stuff like this for an annual fee....

Railway sort here. Where(ish) in the UK are you? Are you in the Forces? How old is DS?

DH and I use Two Together, it pays for itself for one return trip to London!

We are in East Anglia.

DS2 has a YP Railcard, OH has an Annual Gold Card and a Forces Discount Card as he is military currently posted in London.

Every card is giving me different prices and I need a rail card that I can use when I am going anywhere on my own.

On your own nothing will apply unless you are in the network rail card area
www.network-railcard.co.uk/clientfiles/files/Map.pdf

On weekdays you can only use the nr card after 10am.

You could try a two together rail card.

to repeat - if you are over 25 and under 60 and not in the network south-east area, there is NO railcard that you can use alone.

there are quite often special offers on them and you can pay ridiculously low prices if travelling with a child, even on the seriously expensive lines into London. So it may pay off on one journey.