I was stuck on a broken down train with no aircon, food or water for three hours… then after getting of the train I had to sit at Bournemouth train station for an hour and a half, stand on a packed train(four trains worth of rush hour traffic)for another hour, followed by an hour a half sat at Winchester train station before finally getting on another packed train which went to london, then a forty minute trip on the tube, after which I had to get a train to Birmingham New street, change at BNS (12.30 am) and finally get a train to Stafford…

Took me 11 hours when it should have taken three and at the time I was 15 and on my way home on my own, which aint good when you have to go through london and BNS late at night..

Thanks for reading so closely. I should point out that I’m not an American, but a fellow Briton. However I have been living in mainland Europe for the past 10 years. I might have been colorful in some of my descriptions and some details of the actual experiences may be hazy in my mind, but I can assure you that there is little undue exaggeration.

Just to clarify and respond to your points:

The £92 was indeed for a pre-9am departure. It is much cheaper if you travel later in the day. The 10.42 example (it might have been 10.25 – all I remember is 10 something) example was actually from a separate journey. I did sacrifice some accuracy for the sake of the narrative.

To be very honest I forget the exact prices for different combinations of time of departure, single, return, super-saver, cheap day return, etc etc. What I did conclude is that the fare structures are ridiculously complex and there do seem to be cases where one might qualify for a vastly reduced fare by making slight alterations to plans, or as in my case, by buying a discount return fare which as I recall was cheaper than the standard single fare (for which no discount option was available).

Perhaps you might also be interested in my take on bus services by way of comparison: http://ecolocalizer.com/2008/04/03/british-busses-actually-worse-than-british-trains/

Mark.

I live in Coventry and commute every day from Coventry station to Birmingham, and have done the shockingly expensive Coventry-London trip on occasion. You say you paid £92 for a single at 10:42? Either a blatant lie or a shocking mistake, I’m afraid! It may be £92 before 09:30, but after that time you wouldn’t pay more than £40.

Secondly, you were misled – two singles may be cheaper than a return, but a return cannot be cheaper than 1 single.