Oxford flights set to take off (From Oxford Mail)

Fantastic, improvements to the public transport infrastructure around Oxford is always welcome.

£51 is great value for a single, there is only one direct service to/from Edinburgh each weekday and it costs a staggering £235 return.

Andrew:Oxford wrote:
Fantastic, improvements to the public transport infrastructure around Oxford is always welcome.

£51 is great value for a single, there is only one direct service to/from Edinburgh each weekday and it costs a staggering £235 return.

That should have read:-

"There is only one direct *rail* service to/from Edinburgh each weekday and it costs a staggering £235 return."

Andrew:Oxford wrote:

Andrew:Oxford wrote:
Fantastic, improvements to the public transport infrastructure around Oxford is always welcome.

£51 is great value for a single, there is only one direct service to/from Edinburgh each weekday and it costs a staggering £235 return.

That should have read:-

"There is only one direct *rail* service to/from Edinburgh each weekday and it costs a staggering £235 return."

or 2 singles costing £51 and £63 for each leg, and if you don't mind changing (it is actually quicker than going direct) you can get the outward from Oxford for £46. On long journeys 2 singles are always cheaper than a return, unless you book months in advance.

I would be interested to know if anyone has found flights for £51.
The dates I looked at in March were over £200 return.

Grunden Skip wrote:

Andrew:Oxford wrote:

Andrew:Oxford wrote:
Fantastic, improvements to the public transport infrastructure around Oxford is always welcome.

£51 is great value for a single, there is only one direct service to/from Edinburgh each weekday and it costs a staggering £235 return.

That should have read:-

"There is only one direct *rail* service to/from Edinburgh each weekday and it costs a staggering £235 return."

or 2 singles costing £51 and £63 for each leg, and if you don't mind changing (it is actually quicker than going direct) you can get the outward from Oxford for £46. On long journeys 2 singles are always cheaper than a return, unless you book months in advance.

Indeed

And due to the bizarre way that train fares are calculated and apportioned booking a ticket on the same direct service to and from Edinburgh, but choosing a ticket to Croy instead (change at Edinburgh) brings the cost down to £130 return. This is because the direct Oxford-Edinburgh ticket is priced by Cross Country and the Croy-Oxord ticket is priced by Virgin.

I usually go "megatrain" from Birmingham. £1 each way to Glasgow or Edinburgh.

Phisher wrote:
I would be interested to know if anyone has found flights for £51.
The dates I looked at in March were over £200 return.

Just checked.

Out 14th March, back 18th March. £102.15 return.

Andrew:Oxford wrote:

Phisher wrote:
I would be interested to know if anyone has found flights for £51.
The dates I looked at in March were over £200 return.

Just checked.

Out 14th March, back 18th March. £102.15 return.

Andrew. Mrs Skip needs to go up to "Eddy" as she calls it, for her Mothers 80th birthday celebration in march, it is going on for a few days,and she needs to go up on Monday 25th and come back down on Thurs 28th. The cheapest return is £202.15 and a fully flexible return in case something should happen unexpectedly is a whopping £402.15. So it looks like this is a case of all aeroplane companies prices advertising, as long as there is ONE seat available at the advertised price on the flight, it doesn't matter how much the other 50 or so cost. At least on the train, booking two months in advance gives you the choice of ALL seats on the train.

Where are all these £200+ rail fares coming from? An off-peak return is £133. It is fully flexible, for a return any time within a month. THe only restriction is you have to leave after 0930 for any leg happening on weekday; weekends are fully flexible.

I'd advise against advance fares in all but some cases. They are completely inflexible and often don't save you much money.

I don't deny the air fare is attractive, and the rail fare system is confusing, but let's not overstate the case, eh?

Grunden Skip wrote:

Andrew:Oxford wrote:

Phisher wrote:
I would be interested to know if anyone has found flights for £51.
The dates I looked at in March were over £200 return.

Just checked.

Out 14th March, back 18th March. £102.15 return.

Andrew. Mrs Skip needs to go up to "Eddy" as she calls it, for her Mothers 80th birthday celebration in march, it is going on for a few days,and she needs to go up on Monday 25th and come back down on Thurs 28th. The cheapest return is £202.15 and a fully flexible return in case something should happen unexpectedly is a whopping £402.15. So it looks like this is a case of all aeroplane companies prices advertising, as long as there is ONE seat available at the advertised price on the flight, it doesn't matter how much the other 50 or so cost. At least on the train, booking two months in advance gives you the choice of ALL seats on the train.

I'm not surprised that there are limited economy seats on Thursday 28th. The following day is Good Friday...

You are, of course, guaranteed that you won't need to stand on the plane (even though you have booked the seat).

King Joke wrote:
Where are all these £200+ rail fares coming from? An off-peak return is £133. It is fully flexible, for a return any time within a month. THe only restriction is you have to leave after 0930 for any leg happening on weekday; weekends are fully flexible.

I'd advise against advance fares in all but some cases. They are completely inflexible and often don't save you much money.

I don't deny the air fare is attractive, and the rail fare system is confusing, but let's not overstate the case, eh?

It's not very handy to leave after 09.30 on a weekday though, especially for long distance travel. More so with XC specified fares where you may be travelling from North of Edinburgh and you still can't travel before 09:30! It means, unless you know how to circumnavigate the rules, the earliest you can reach Oxford can be late afternoon.

Of course, most educated rail travellers are aware of the little quirks such as a ticket from London to Edinburgh/Glasgow is cheaper than a ticket from Oxford to Edinburgh/Glasgow yet is valid via Oxford.

Then there is the ticket I previously mentioned that is priced by Virgin which is valid before 9.30...