Are your flights on the same airline?

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The train one is because the singles are advance fairs where you have to travel on the designated trains (which can be a pain but worth it for the discount) but the return would be an open return enabling you to travel at any time on the designated day (or on some any time within a month)

So it isn’t that confusing.

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@Kevin May, In my experience it doesn’t matter whether you travel on the same airline or not – other than using an open-jaw rather than a pair of singles. Open-jaws, however, are, in my experience, always more expensive than a comparable return. And returns are (always in my experience) far, far more expensive than singles. For example, last year we needed a one-way to Brussels from Zurich as we were returning by train and that cost over 1,000 francs versus around 400ish Francs for a return. (So I could fly twice for under half the price of a single flight? Huh?)

@Joe, the train situation results from the train firms using what I understand to be similar pricing models to airlines – ie they’re using “Yield Management” which is something I won’t claim to understand. Here in Switzerland, we have the same price for tickets regardless of how far in advance you book, if at all. The cost of running the train doesn’t vary in proportion to when you book the ticket. Furthermore, hiking the price for later bookings can act as a throttle on demand by discouraging last-minute trips – esp by leisure travellers.

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Flights – Yes, well, one really should have spoken to a travel agent, rather than try and DIY that sort of thing. An open jaw may well have been the answer (and no, they are not always more expensive – it does, however, depend on where you are open – jawing to and from, of course and with whom. And returns, depending on where to and from are very often, very, very much cheaper than singles. Depends on route, class and how you work it and a GDS is a must for that sort of thing.(I think @Mark means singles are more expensive than returns!)

Actually, the return part does not always need to be to where one is coming from and sometimes, you don’t do a return at all – you do from A to B to C – and I have even done from A to B to C RETURN which was cheaper then A to B single!!

Trains. Ugh. The privatised rail system is a ruddy disgrace since old Beardie and a few other egits took it over. Who was the last outfit to undertake a major project and complete it on time and on budget? – British Rail.

Who got the best reliability for train arrivals – British Rail AND that without having to exclude bus replacement bits or padding out arrival times or closing doors early. And I don’t recall British Rail racking up £25bn-odd debt.

BR had one board of Directors unlike the fat cat system we now have. Why? Mainly because the first thing the newly privatised railway outfits did was get rid of anyone who knew how to run a railway.

So, what we know have is a Labour Government with a Railway Minister who probably woudn’t know what a train was if it hit him in the face, whilst old Beardie trousers pushing £24 mill for massaging when you can use off peak fares and since 1997, more than doubling some of the normal fares.

It’s about time people realised how Virgin (inter alia) have screwed up our railway system. The sooner the thing is re-nationalised, as with Network Rail, the better.

After all, in Switzerland the trains work. In Germany, the trains work and in France they work very well indeed – and they have high speed rail and trains that are clean and on time (without padding) – even the Dutch manage to run a good railway – in fact the only country where they don’t work is here. Puff, puff, pant, wheeze, gasp…

Sorry, rant over, got a bit carried away, there.

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@murray – hear, hear.

Maybe Travel Rants should launch a Nationalise the Rail Network campaign.

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Have the same thing on rail tickets here, single £12 return £30 to London, both restricted both advance purchase… and it happens all the time, stopped looking for return tickets now. A flexible ticket costs £70 return upwards.

Even better in January booking last minute second class £25 single, First Class £22…… I must say first class is nice

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@Murray and Kevin

And it cost the tax payer more now than it did under BR as well.

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With the airlines, it’s not so much that they charge more as they charge less if you book a return ticket with them. This isn’t always the situation though. Some low-cost airlines charge the same fee, regardless of whether it’s a one-way or return ticket. I remember booking a ticket on Air Canada years ago where it was actually cheaper to buy a return ticket and throw away the return portion than buy a one-way ticket.

What you could do to save money is buy a multi-destination ticket rather than two one way tickets. It allows you to change segments, have layovers and a different end destination. It’s not as cheap as a return ticket between two points but it would certainly be cheaper than buying the two one-way tickets. Once again, it depends on the airline.

Isn’t flying fun?

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Like you Darren I would never have thought to do that. I can never get to grips with the train fares in this country, but the good thing with the East coast line to London is that if it is delayed you receive a percentage of your ticket price back.

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The flight thing I really can’t understand. Heathrow to LA, on Virgin – but the others are much the same – 400 return or 800 single. If anyone could possibly explain this to be I’d be very glad. Thanks! Toby.

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