Great Western Coffee Shop

Hello. I think I've found a ticketing error, and I'm wondering whether to take advantage of it. The GWR website lets me buy an off-peak single using my railcard for the 6:53 train on Monday the 9th of April from Oxford to Paddington. Which is a good saving compared to the full price of £32.60. But 1) I don't think the normal rules should let me use an off-peak ticket at 6:53 in the morning and 2) I don't think I can use a Network railcard at this time in the morning either. I'm inclined to the view that if the website sells me a ticket for this train, then I'm OK to buy it, and I can justify it if a ticket inspector asks - let's face it, the rules are so unbelievably complicated who knows what's allowed nowadays?

However. When I tried to complete the purchase online, the website said that no reservations for the 6:53 were available. So I'm guessing that if I buy this ticket online, I'll just receive a paper off-peak ticket with no time written on it, ie nothing to say that the website sold me that ticket for the 6:53am service. I have to catch that train or a similar one, so I refrained from purchasing. I'd be interested to hear what anyone else thinks, please.

Buy the ticket, print your confirmation email/itinerary.

Contract law and the Consumer Act 2015 are on your side.

Provided that you can obtain a printed confirmation that the ticket is valid on the service that you intended to use, then I would buy and use the ticket.
If however "the system" will ONLY issue you an off peak ticket with no proof as to its validity at your intended time of travel, then I would think twice.

It might well be a bug in the system, but that is not your worry.

If this is a "bug", it has to be a Godzilla-size one. Starting Monday 5th March, National Rail journey planner will offer a vast selection of early morning "off peak" fares for journeys vaguely to / via the London area, in contradiction of the restriction code shown on the same website.

How did you find that out, Trowres? Is it generally available public knowledge, please?

Simple trial and error with www.nationalrail.com; starting with your initial lucky discovery and using a straddle-and-close-in approach to find the date. Tried a few more nearby origins and worked out... also to journeys with fares set by other operators.

So far, the most extreme example of "vaguely via London" I have tried that works is Trowbridge-York (which for some reason also works via Bristol, in addition to via London)... and an "anytime" return suddenly becomes super-off-peak (one month validity).

It beats doing Sudoku.