Commuters forced to buy more expensive ‘flex’ tickets on LNER trains

Commuters are being forced to buy more expensive “flex” tickets on LNER trains from the end of this month as the company withdraws off-peak fares.

LNER’s 70-minute Flex tickets, which let travellers use trains up to 70 minutes either side of a pre-booked journey time, were being expanded across 26 stations between London and Scotland, the train company said.

Critics have claimed that the tickets are a way for LNER to increase prices by withdrawing cheaper off-peak and super off-peak fares.

It comes after official data showed that train cancellations on the East Coast Main Line operator reached their highest level on record, with an average of five per cent of its services – 2,657 trains – partially or fully withdrawn between July last year and this June.

An LNER spokesman said that from September 30, “three simpler fare options will be available from more than 20 stations located around or between the hub stations of Newcastle, Berwick-upon-Tweed and Edinburgh, for LNER customers connecting to or starting their journey from London King’s Cross.”

The new tickets, known as “fixed”, “semi-flexible” and “fully flexible”, will replace the old system of anytime, off-peak and super off-peak.

When Government-owned LNER’s flex tickets were first introduced in January, super off-peak fares between London and Edinburgh cost £87.

Today, the cheapest ticket available from LNER’s website is £107.80 for an advance – or £127.80 for the new flagship “semi flexible” fare. This is an increase of 46 per cent on the old super off-peak ticket.

Anytime single tickets, which allow travel on any train at any time of day, have been rebranded as “fully flexible” fares – and are available at £199.60 in standard class.

Roger French, a transport blogger, writing in January when the first flex tickets were introduced, said: “This pilot is all about doing away with off-peak tickets by the back door. The Department for Transport is testing passenger reaction to a new era of rail ticket price extortion.”

Mark Smith, another travel blogger who writes as The Man In Seat 61, said there were positives and negatives to the new ticket type.

“LNER have done the right thing by pricing all their fares one-way and by simplifying fares to show an easily understood choice of inflexible, semi-flex and full-flex prices for each train. It’s a big step forward,” he said.

“But their chosen ‘semi-flex fare’ (the 70 Minute Flex) is simply not flexible enough compared to the time-honoured Off-Peak fare it replaces, making it a much worse deal.

“The Off-Peak fare was refundable, allowed stopovers, could be used on any operator by any permitted route and was good for absolutely any train at weekends and any off-peak train weekdays. Their new 70-minute flex is only good for the booked train +/- 70 minutes, no refunds, no stopovers, by LNER trains only, by the direct route only.

“The lack of refundability alone means passengers could lose a lot of money if their plans change through no fault of their own. I firmly believe this should be addressed before any further roll-out.”

LNER said most of its customers chose to buy fixed tickets because they offered excellent value, and this was still the case during the company’s “simpler fares” pilot – adding that in August, around half of all 70-minute flex fares cost less than the withdrawn super off-peak fare.

Meanwhile, the cheapest airline fares between London and Edinburgh for travel this week are £74 – even cheaper than the old train tickets – according to Skyscanner data reviewed by The Telegraph.

Pro-railway campaigners often claim that taxes need to be increased on all other methods of travel, such as by increasing fuel duty and air passenger duty, because otherwise trains are too expensive to compete with flights, coaches and private cars.

Train ticket prices are high because railways are extremely costly to run and maintain. Last year, Network Rail received taxpayer subsidies of £7.5 billion, with passenger train companies needing another £4.4 billion on top of that.

Labour has said it will nationalise all passenger train companies into a new state-owned operator called Great British Railways. Louise Haigh, the transport secretary, has said this would “put the passenger first”.

LNER, however, was nationalised in 2018 after Virgin Trains East Coast, the previous private operator, handed it back to the Government when it ran into financial difficulties.