Next week, I'm in East Anglia:
Melksham to Peterborough, Sunday evening (leave 17:25)
Peterborough to Melksham, Friday evening (arrive 19:11)
Best return fare offered - 216 pounds anytime return.

But looking at the booking the other way:
Peterborough to Melksham, Friday evening (arrive 19:11)
Melksham to Peterborough, Sunday evening (leave 17:25)
Best return fare offered - 92 pounds 50p - super offpeak return

Same train, same journey, other way round.   Which is correct?  Can I specifically buy a super offpeak Melksham to Peterborough and validly use it

A passenger holds an advanced fare from PAD^» (Paddington (London) - next trains) to CNM^» (Cheltenham Spa - next trains) for Thursday evening (30 pounds). However, on Tuesday his plans are changed and he goes to PAD to ask to change this to a ticket from PAD to MKM^» (Melksham (Station code) - next trains) for Wednesday evening, using "maximum flexibiity" and expecting to to charged a tenner. However, he's told that he cannot change the ROUTE of the ticket, and is offered a 76 pound fare with "you're choosing to travel at the most expensive time of day"

Passenger is assured, however, that his PAD to CNM ticket can be used on Thursday evening for a journey on that same train, joining at SWI^» (Swindon - next trains) for the journey to CNM.

I was / am the passenger, and am slightly surprised
a) Surely maximum flexibility should let me buy an MKM ticket rather than a CNM?
b) I didn't think joining late was allowed on advance tickets?

Three things I'm not surprised at
c) "you're choosing to travel at the most expensive time of day" ... but no alternative suggested.  Apart from sleeping on the platform overnight, when would have been cheaper??  I would have been happy to wait for the 19:30, but there's no connection ...
d) In the end I bought a fresh PAD to DID^» (Didcot Parkway - next trains) peak, and a super offpeak DID to MKM, suitable for the 17:30 change at SWI, but flexible (in so far as I could at least get to CPM^» (Chippenham - next trains) at any time)
e) An announcement on the train that "Off peak tickets are not valid on this service", even though mine was ... and indeed was accepted without question by two menacing looking bruisers who passed through the carriage checking everyone's tickets.

I ended up travelling on the 18:00 off PAD, which is supposed to arrive at CPM two minutes before the early evening (also First) bus.   The train was 2 minues late into CPM;  not trusting the connection, I had taken up favour - a kind offer of a lift, and my pickup told me that the bus had pulled out as the train entered the station.  Another nice one First ... after the 7.15 bus the next one's 10.15

Can anyone comment on (a) and (b) - should I have been allowed to change my ticket as I wanted?   And am I able to use it this evening on the 19:53 SWI to CNM?

Cast list:
PAD - Paddington
DID - Didcot
SWI - Swindon
CPM - Chippenham
MKM - Melksham
CNM - Cheltenham

Hi, Max and welcome to the forum

You're caught between something of a rock and a hard place.   The official answer is to suggest that the best you can do is to hand it in to lost property at your local station; if that's FGW^▸ (First Great Western) operated, then the pen will make its way to Bristol and the lost property place there is the natural place where people will ask.  You may have read some criticism of their systems on here, but it's as real struggle to get property back to people and there's no easy answer.

If the professionals in Bristol don't reach the right person, I fear you (or others) have little chance of doing so yourself.  Of course, it's just possible that the person who lost the pen, or more likely a contact of his / hers is on here, could get in touch, and then - happy days - it would be sorted. Stranger things have happened, but being realistic you can't rely on them.

The sillyness is that a little bit or pre-publicity on the engineering signs "from Monday onwards, we'll be operating a new layout and there may be delays of up to ten minutes as we bed in" would have been understood by commuters, and should have obviated the need for blame assignment, fines, etc which all end up being paid for by the customer or taxpayer anyway!

I love playing with figures ....

Passenger growth by station operator (percentage, year to March 2011, year to 2012):

 112.72 68070475 76727936 "london midland trains"
 107.82 149781128 161490108 "national express east anglia"
 106.09 118666068 125888884 "first scotrail"
 109.15 106573058 116328320 "northern rail"
 102.49 1627348 1667834 "south west trains (island line)"
 107.53 191026233 205418462 "southern"
 110.96 33586328 37267690 "chiltern railways"
  95.49 75519049 72112632 "merseyrail"
 102.86 38374508 39472600 "east midlands trains"
  77.94 432334 336982 "glasgow prestwick airport"
 104.13 32308884 33643264 "east coast"
 105.22 253096633 266306990 "south west trains"
 157.52 51563890 81225196 "london overground"
 103.90 21470589 22308272 "first transpennine express"
 115.07 25882993 29783456 "london underground"
 103.07 37382672 38528568 "virgin trains (west coast)"
 106.44 120066730 127795492 "first capital connect"
 102.62 175640492 180237504 "southeastern"
 102.35 53647288 54906734 "arriva trains wales"
 107.10 112344542 120318740 "first great western"
 104.51 601917586 629047816 "network rail"
 107.54 44534718 47890560 "c2c"

And by the nuts2 Spatial area (whatever that is!):

 102.39 49977364 51170394 "hampshire and isle of wight"
 103.09 26498790 27316820 "east wales"
 105.27 74789020 78728704 "berkshire, buckinghamshire and oxfordshire"
 104.07 4469948 4651958 "highlands and islands"
 102.32 8926140 9133172 "tees valley and durham"
 108.92 760559871 828424122 "inner london"
 108.78 44060634 47931182 "eastern scotland"
 105.40 13420824 14145780 "shropshire and staffordshire"
 107.94 63675866 68729378 "greater manchester"
 104.25 16272145 16963018 "cheshire"
 101.84 19445580 19804282 "west wales and the valleys"
 104.99 32776012 34410406 "east anglia"
  99.61 6133492 6109552 "cumbria"
 102.64 61580672 63205592 "kent"
 118.46 75320926 89224454 "west midlands"
 102.27 10485842 10724308 "dorset and somerset"
 104.84 70209155 73606708 "bedfordshire and hertforshire"
 106.30 34106754 36256644 "gloucestershire, wiltshire and north somerset"
 107.17 308778380 330912436 "outer london"
 104.69 155180581 162461518 "surrey, east & west sussex"
 108.75 4641314 5047596 "north eastern scotland"
 103.57 15987456 16558960 "lancashire"
 106.31 111168755 118182576 "south western scotland"
 109.08 15404456 16802502 "herefordshire, worcestershire and warwickshire"
 103.66 19363990 20072896 "derbyshire and nottinghamshire"
 102.55 60886855 62437498 "west yorkshire"
 104.20 18910926 19706058 "south yorkshire"
 108.74 13628096 14819516 "devon"
 121.36 5066746 6149060 "cornwall and isles of scilly"
 102.76 10575170 10866722 "northumberland and tyne and wear"
 101.69 13365932 13592130 "leicestershire, rutland and northamptonshire"
 104.69 13923262 14575994 "north yorkshire"
 103.57 5844128 6052646 "east riding and north linconshire"
 103.53 71146901 73657774 "essex"
  98.99 92414145 91482434 "merseyside"
 106.02 4517418 4789250 "lincolnshire"

Please excuse all lower cased places and companies - it appears that some data lines have First Scotrail and other First ScotRail (nice clean data set  ) and it was easier just to thump them all to lower case!

106.71 2313514557 2468853618 grand totals

Yes, indeed ... from the waiting room on platform 4

There *are* some daft things (like the buffet location and hours) at #11, but it's not in West Cornwall.  The new DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) figures show over 1000 interchanges there per day, and I think their definition is rail to rail.  I certainly account for 1 of those interchanges on days I pass by the place.

Yeppp ... I've rather a good selection of Taunton pictures. 

Number 11 ain't Severn Beach line, nor indeed Bristol ...

Gosh ... both pictures that I took in March, one in a place that's very familiar indeed to both you and one of our admins. The other one's an interchange that I used when looking to travel without the need to take on a mortgage to pay the fare.

Trafford Road Bridge control box ... Manchester Ship Canal.  Just a few hundred yards from my Salford Tram picture ...

I'll finish these two off tomorrow morning ... very surprised than no-one has answered them ...

They must be read with caution and caveats, and local knowledge 

And I note some shining examples of improvements where a decent service is provided:
Dronfield   12502   14882   17548   17710   35372   114552   144228    152792
Parson Street   7231   14293   19172   32511   46670   57374   68840    77722
Severn Beach   29295   37088   38202   54034   74712   88504   113480    141714

And what happens when a TOC^▸ (Train Operating Company) reduces services:
27446   24426   22001   38081   27656   10028   11046    11330   

3580   PLY^» (Plymouth - next trains)   PL4 6AB   SX 476554   50.3778173616   -4.1433631306   Plymouth   1519011   1629011   1845958   2026852   2249849   2278718   2401082    2596746

Last figure 2011/12 then goes back year by year.

Our "page top charts" updated too - look for stations in an area, and for stations with similar passenger numbers.

http://www.firstgreatwestern.info/smr/SVB.html

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