Try this:-

http://cjm.fotopic.net/c1164891.html

But there is for farm livestock !

We use Warminster to Waterloo quite regularly. Since the "fares simplification" the lowest fare available has actually gone down very slightly.
However before simplification, you could get the lowest fare up to 1800 the day before - not any more; you are very lucky if you can get the lowest fare within 10 days of travel now.

Bit late on this one.

You buy your "b to c" ticket on line and ask to collect it from your ticket machine.

Right, just so that I understand this correctly; a third rail is dangerous, rails one and two carrying a train weighing hundreds of tons at 100+ MPH isn't ? 

Can I go away and think about that one ?   

Something worth a mention is that if you pay an extra ^2 on your "advance" ticket to London you can travel right across the London travel area.
My daughter travels from Warminster to Rochester in Kent. If she buys a ticket to W'loo then one to Rochester that costs her ^4 more than an "advance" + ^2 to "Abbey Wood" (Kent not Bristol !) and a ticket from Abbey Wood to Rochester.

I hope the would-be thieves were wearing gloves - not for fingerprint purposes, but have you seen the state of the touch screens on most of these machines ?  Yuk !!

The pedants surface again !   

As this incident happened "a few years ago" (I cut and paste that bit now !) "Customer Services" hadn't been invented then; proper customer service was death with by the train staff and the ticket office staff not a bunch of faceless "managers" sitting in an office block in Plymouth, whose sole aim in life is to make it too damn' difficult for people to complain !

Oh dear,  I do wish people would at least read what I put in my post. I said this happened "a few years ago", not last week or last year ! And before anyone asks I didn't get the name of the man who was writing the refund chits either.

Apart from which:- could I quote from the (current !) FGW website ?

"If you hold a First Class ticket for a high speed service and have to stand for more than 20 minutes (or more than one stop where this is longer than 20 minutes), we will refund you in National Rail vouchers the difference between the cost of your First Class ticket for the affected leg of your journey and the corresponding Standard Class ticket. To claim your refund, you must contact a member of the on-board staff at the time of travel for verification, then make your claim by contacting our Customer Services Team."

Without wishing to appear pedantic (which some denizens of this site appear to be !) - this appears to be exactly what happened to myself and the other passengers, as I related in my OP^▸ (Original Poster / topic starter).

Verification = refund chit
Customer Services Team = Ticket Office

It would appear, therefore, that the details of my little story were not only correct "a few years ago"; but are in fact correct for the present day as well.

I didn't say a refund was issued - I said "refund chits" were issued, to be redeemed at a ticket office.  As I was travelling on an MoD warrant I handed mine back to my travel office, who did say that they had never seen one before !

I came across another version of this a few years ago. Two of us were travelling First Class Chippenham to Paddington during the rush hour. The train was "taken out of service" at Swindon; all the occupants, plus those already on the platform were told to get on the next train. This was physically impossible due to gross overcrowding. We managed to get on the one after that, the First Class coaches were packed, with people standing all down the car and in the vestibules.
Then the Guard/Train Manager/Ticket Inspector fought his way down the coach. A disgruntled passenger standing next to me asked if he could have a refund as he had paid for a First Class ticket.
The reply ? "You are travelling Fist Class Sir, if you want a refund go and stand in Standard Class". I thought this passenger's head was going to explode - he went the colour of a beetroot and screamed "What did you say ?".
At this point the Guard/Train Manager/Ticket Inspector realised he had perhaps not said the most sensible thing and rapidly produced a pad of refund chits and a pen. We abandoned the train at Reading, the Guard/Train Manager/Ticket Inspector was still in that same coach writing refund notes as if his life depended on it - which it probably did !

The problem is that you always think that you can make your connection and if you stop for a note you will miss it. Invariably you carry on and miss it and have no note either !

Probably the best position to adopt is to refuse to pay any extra on the train, just give your name and address, (as you legally have to).

It is a civil matter so the railway company would have to try and sue you.
a.  Would they bother, for a few quid ?
b.  If they did bother, I don't think it would be too difficult for you to get info to prove you had a genuine case.

There was a case recently where a lady + kids, (who was actually breaking the rules anyway !)  refused to pay an extra ^188 to GNER^▸ (Great North Eastern Railways), the case was dropped - perhaps because it made the National press !