Thousands of rail customers have been hit with a shock fare hike following a ticket glitch with a major rail carrier

THOUSANDS of rail customers saw a shock increase in ticket prices this week after a major rail operator unexpectedly increased fares.

The Sun has learned that South Western Railway increased fares on 522 routes to and from London last week after a major glitch meant fares in March did not rise in line with other rail fares.

The train company, which says it carries more than 220,000 passengers each day, gave no warning that fares would rise, leaving some rail passengers shocked when their usual fare changed without warning.

The affected journeys were routes that included travel on the capital’s metro network.

If you live outside of London, you can usually buy a city ticket which includes travel on the London Underground.

But a number of those routes didn’t go up in price properly in March, when rail fares typically rise.

The Department for Transport has confirmed that rail fares will rise by an average of 4.9% on March 3 this year, a huge blow to commuters.

One passenger who noticed their fares had accidentally gone up last week told The Sun: “My normal journey was costing a lot more than usual and I assumed it was a mistake.

“So it was really annoying when I emailed SWR and they said it was actually the right price, it was just wrong for the rest of the year.

“I didn’t factor it in because I assumed the previous price was for the whole year, so it’s just another additional cost for the work.”

In an email to an SWR customer, he said: “Recently there has been an increase in certain fares from some SWR stations to London where a journey by tube is included.

“This is due to an anomaly in these fares following the fare hike in March this year, where some fares did not see the increase they were supposed to, leaving the original 2023 fare unchanged.

“As such, this price increase is overdue and therefore the new price is correct.”

An SWR spokesman told The Sun: “Following the March changes, we identified 522 (0.009%) of these prices which did not increase in line with other tariffs, which we are now correcting.

“All 522 fares are for fares that interact with TfL (Transport for London) and were missed due to incorrect timing within the industry system and we are fixing them.

“The low number of customers using these tariffs benefited from the lower original price during this period, meaning no one was left out of pocket.”

How can I save on train fares?

If you regularly travel on the same routes, for example when commuting, it may be worthwhile to purchase an annual pass.

National Rail says that if you do the same journey three or more days a week, a seven-day pass is likely to save you money.

You can use National Rail’s free online calculator to help you work out your savings.

You can also save money by splitting tickets. Trainline usually does this for you, but another site you can use to split your journey is Splitticketing.co.uk.

You won’t need to transfer – split tickets are valid if the train calls at the station where you are buying the tickets.

Getting a railcard can help cut your fares by up to a third on each journey.

You can get 16-25 or 26-30 railcards if you are between 16-30 years old.

There are also ‘two together’ railcards which allow you to get a third discount if you regularly travel as a pair – but you have to travel together to use it.

Do you have a money problem that needs to be solved? Contact us by email at money-sm@news.co.uk.

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