Great Western Coffee Shop

Trying to purchase tickets online is more than an anomaly it’s downright impossible. I need to purchase these for when a friend is visiting. We wish to travel on Thameslink from Farringdon to / from Brighton. But the route - whilst actually direct - is impossible to book tickets for. Quite simply none of the booking systems recognise this as a valid route.

I have tried booking with Trainline, GWR, SWT, and Thameslink itself.

The result is always a convoluted route of anything up to 4 changes.

Typically here’s the Thameslink routing:

Route:
Farringdon to Whitechapel (Elizabeth Line)
Whitechapel to Victoria (Underground)
Victoria to Brighton (Gatwick Exp.)

It does not offer a direct routing.

The other companies sites offer equally weird routes such as via the Bakerloo Line, and London Bridge to Victoria for the Gatwick Express.

Have you spot-checked a different date? Strike day or engineering work, perhaps.

There are two flavours of Farringdon Station: Farringdon, code ZFD (which is the Thameslink one), and Farringdon (Elizabeth Line), code FDX. The GWR planner works with the first and refuses the second. NRE's planner won't even let you enter FDX.

Not very clever, these journey planners, are they?

In NRE I can do a FZP to CTK and it gives me a via ZFD (CTK City Thamesink) using the Elizebth Line

However to go to BFR (Blackfriars) NRE insists on send you via the underground!

The same absurdity if you want to go to St Pancras NRE will send you via the Circle Line and not via Farringdon Liz Line / Thameslink change

Hopefully the May timetable change will sort out these journeys

I tend to agree with Hafren. What date(s) are you looking at? I've just looked at Tuesday 24th January with gwr.com and it shows all direct services.

The dates we were looking at were the actual dates required: Dec 22 2022

Fastest journey problem I think.

Going via tube & VIC is quicker than the slower TLink…

Looks like a data issue...

https://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/search/detailed/gb-nr:ZFD/2022-12-22/0000-2359?stp=WVS&show=all&order=wtt&toc=TL

No Thameslink trains in the database for a large chunk of the day! This is repeatable across the Thameslink network and on different dates that week, and seems too widespread to be related to works or anything to do with planning for the action short of strike. Data upload glitch or not wanting to confirm how industrial action affects things yet, I wonder.

But not good for the customer. Given it's not far off, some will buy more expensive tickets and plan longer journeys as a result.

Here’s an option from GWR:

Farringdon - Brighton
Thu 22 Dec 2022 1 passenger

Changes: 2

Elizabeth Line
*       09:02 Farringdon 08m
*       09:05 Tottenham Court Road (Elizabeth line)
*       09:07 Bond Street (Elizabeth line)
*       09:10 London Paddington
Connection time: 15m

Undrrground
*       09:25 London Paddington 17m Journey time
*       09:42 London Victoria
Connection time: 17m

Gatwick Express
*       09:59 London Victoria 58m
*       10:31 Gatwick Airport
*       10:43 Haywards Heath
*       10:57 Brighton

====

Not good indeed - the fares quoted usually include Gatwick Express for some reason. Thameslink only aka direct offer the cheapest fares which is what we need. The fares seem to be available from ticket machines.

We also tried JourneyCheck.com but got the message ‘You are forbidden to use this link’

But we only want the direct service TLink service sans any diversion esp. not using Gatwick Express. Yet the ticketing sites are refusing that route. I did try Farringdon Thameslink to Blackfriars via City Thameslink and was told this route does not exist. But it’s been there for years. I wonder if MTR have interfered and are insisting that TfL always route tickets using the Elizabeth Line?

It looks like some trains are in the database after 5pm, so if your main concern is to get the system to sell you a (non-AP) ticket for that date, you could try an evening journey.

Hold fire & you'll be able to see them in a day or so.

From Thameslink twitter feed (https://twitter.com/tlrailuk/status/1599424147146375176?s=43&t=rPCy00iwsFyIIuVRCszgbQ)

I often have to go to Three Bridges for work, I shifted to Thameslink / Circle Line to Padd / Maidenhead during the lockdowns.   Even with hardly any travellers the single change at Farringdon and the closeness of plat 14 at Padd to the Circle made for a simpler and actually faster journey time.

Now its a no brainer Thameslink / Liz Line is far simpler and one change ................. what's not to like

Thameslink tell me that the peiblem has been solved & that all joureys arebow correctly being shown in journeyplanners. Excellent customer service received