di2315

Hello

I have looked at both National Express & Oxford Bus Company for details on purchasing tickets for travel from Heathrow to Oxford.
Both sites seem to imply that I must purchase a ticket prior to my day of travel on their bus. I don't really know how long it is going to take me to get through baggage collection, customs etc, so don't feel inclined to pre-purchase for a particular time.

Does anyone know if you can just walk up and buy a ticket prior to boarding with either of these companies? Both offer a frequent service, so having to wait for the next bus if one is full, seems preferable to having to rush (or have allowed too much time) to travel on a pre-booked ticket.

Many thanks, Di

janisj

As far as I know you don't have to pre-book. The National Express website is set up so the way to find specific schedules is under the 'Book Coach Tickets' column. But that doesn't mean you must book on line. You can buy tix from at desks at LHR.

flanneruk

I've never prebooked an LHR-Oxford ticket (though a ticket booked online for a specific service is actually valid on any service during the following 24 hrs), and I've never found a full bus in that direction. On this route, unlike the other buses from the terminal, you can buy the tickets from the driver: you don't need to go to the desk BUT:

1. Though the driver takes £, $ and €, he doesn't take credit cards
2. It's £20 single and £22 return. So do what I did the other week, find yourself with just one £20 note and you end up paying £40 for the return journey.
3. Though I've never found a full bus going TO Oxford, it's by no means unheard of for buses at morning weekday peaks towards the airport to be full, with panic breaking out as those left behind start forming cabpooling groups and frantically phone for taxis or partners to get them to the plane on time. I honestly don't know whether, in the panic, it's actually possible for people with specific bookings to get their booking honoured. I think the practicalities are that it isn't, so allow extra time on return early morning weekday journeys.

WillTravel

Best to have smallish change too, not large bills. I will not forget a bus driver, on the LGW-LHR route, who left a Spanish lady standing there in the terminal likely for hours (it was quite late at night), because she had a 50-pound bill and he didn't want to bother with that (he claimed he didn't take large bills and they might be counterfeit).

Cowboy1968

Citing from the Oxford Bus website:
<i>An e-ticket for (i) travel from Oxford to Heathrow or Gatwick or (ii) travel from Heathrow or Gatwick to Oxford, can be used on any departure (either earlier or later) as long as that service departs within 24 hours of the coach that you were booked on. In this instance no seat is guaranteed and the person named on the e-ticket will have to provide photographic ID.</i>

Since you also had no reserved seat if you bought your ticket from the driver or in the bus terminal, you could as well get the ticket online in advance.

If I remember correctly, I did not use that option last time, but simply got a return ticket from one of the machines in the bus terminal to cut the queues at the ticket desks (did not know about the option to buy from driver then).

di2315

Thanks, guys for all those answers!
We will take the pay-the-driver option, have our 20GBP note (plus some coin in reserve), and take our chances. We're seniors, so will take advantage of that discount as well.

Our return trip will be into London instead, and we can't get into our accommodation there until 3pm, so will have plenty of time up our sleeves even if there are stampeding crowds.

As usual, everyone has come up trumps with answers to my quandry . . . many thanks, Di

flanneruk

No. Thank you.

I'd really never noticed (and still can scarcely credit) till your post that it's half price for oldies. If I'd realised: that £20 note would have run to a full return, so I'd have saved £20.

Yet another moral quandary to deal with. It's a disgraceful racket, of course: that people who generally don't have mortagages and growing kids to support get subsidised by those who do. And it's simply barking that biotech zillionaires off to, and from, Silicon Valley get their travelling expenses funded by the poor.

But my whining about it won't do much, my MP's not going to endorse policies that piss off people with little else to do than moan, and the bus companies get publicly mauled if they even suggest that affluent grownups pay their wack.

So, holding my nose as I do so, I'll now make use of yet another way the nanny state drives down the operating costs of Flanneruk Global Enterprises plc, while forcing our whippersnapper competitors to pay for it.

Cowboy1968

I would not worry about going from Oxford to London proper. There are THAT many buses (two competing companies, with buses as frequent as every 10 minutes) going that way, that I would not expect any problems.

Hope you will have fun in Oxford. One of my Top 10 favorite places. Try the Kings Arms pub if you like.. great food and nice atmosphere. Or head NW for a walk along the Thames and the meadows to the Turf Inn if you want to catch a glimpse of the countryside.

di2315

Flanneruk - our hard-earned pennies will still be spent; if not on bus fares, then on meals etc!

Cowboy - thanks for those 2 suggestions. We hadn't planned to eat in the hotel (one is too much like another), so your suggestions are much appreciated. We love to walk and get the feel of an area, so the Thames will be added to our list. Di