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Travel within London and 2-4-1 Offers

Posted by on

Hi friends,

We are two adults traveling to London in June and would like your assistance regarding the local transport options (Oyster PAYG, Travelcard etc.) and also regarding the 2-4-1 offers.

I have read about the 2-4-1 offer on various threads and have also gone through detailed FAQs on daysoutguide.co.uk but am still not very clear on some of the finer details. I’m giving my understanding below and request you to update if it is correct.

We will be traveling to London from Lake District on 20th June using National Rail train service (Lancaster to Euston) and have home printed paper tickets for this journey. We will be in London for 6 days and fly out from Heathrow on 25th June. We can go for the following options for travel during this period and availing 2-4-1 offer:

  1. Buy an Oyster PAYG card for local travel and buy a cheap rail ticket out of London for 25th June and use the two train tickets (Lancaster to London arrival ticket and cheap departure ticket) for availing 2-4-1 offers.

  2. Buy travelcards from an overground station (will Euston station qualify?) and use them for both local travel and availing 2-4-1 offers. I understand that a 7 day travelcard cannot be used for 2-4-1 offers anymore as it is issued as an oyster card only. So we will need to buy separate paper daily travelcards for each day of travel. Is this correct?

I feel that option 1 will turn out to be cheaper for us because of the daily cap on Oyster card charges and we may not even travel much on 1-2 days as we are staying near Central London.

Our main query is whether the home printed, online booked advance ticket from Lancaster to London will be eligible for availing 2-4-1 offers?

Also for the London departure ticket (throwaway) which is the cheapest option available? And should we book it online in advance and take a printout or buy a hard copy at the ticket office at Euston station upon reaching London?

Posted by
5330 posts

7-day travelcards are still issued on paper from National Rail stations.

Although Euston does have some Overground trains, it is managed directly by Network Rail and you can buy them from there.

Print @ Home/Mobile tickets are fine provided they show the National Rail logo.

Posted by
22 posts

Thanks for the update Marco.

Please also update on the cheapest option available for the throwaway ticket for departing our of London.

Posted by
22 posts

Thanks for the updates.

Even if we are able to get travelcards as paper tickets, I feel that Oyster PAYG would turn out cheaper for us as our travel using public transport will be limited.

So in case we need to book a throwaway ticket for departing out of London please suggest which is the cheapest route available.

Posted by
1069 posts

". I understand that a 7 day travelcard cannot be used for 2-4-1 offers anymore as it is issued as an oyster"

You're confusing two different websites, the TFL website will say that because they have nothing to do with the 2 for 1 offers, the offers are sponsored by National Rail.

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