We always offer etickets when we can, but they are not yet available for every journey or ticket type. So, unfortunately, for some journeys and tickets, we can only sell paper tickets.
How do you decide if you can sell an eticket?
As a ticket retailer, in order to see if we’re allowed to sell etickets for a particular journey or ticket type, we have to consult an industry database. Sometimes, it says we can only sell paper tickets, typically because certain train operating companies and stations have not yet upgraded their systems to read the barcodes on etickets.
Ultimately, it’s a decision of the train operating companies, not us. If we had our way, every journey would have etickets available.
What are some journeys you can never buy etickets for?
There are a few circumstances where we can only ever sell paper tickets.
Tickets with cross-London travel
Transport for London (TfL) doesn’t support etickets yet. So, any ticket that includes travel on the London Underground, London Overground or DLR has to be a paper ticket.
Journeys in Scotland on ScotRail
Etickets aren’t yet available on journeys wholly within Scotland on ScotRail services.
When will etickets be more widely available?
We don’t know, but we certainly hope they will be at some point in the future.
We do know that most customers strongly prefer etickets. So, where we can, we’re working with and lobbying the industry to encourage more train operating companies to fully support them.
