Originally Posted by
David-A
If A>C service stops at B, it should be valid to use for an A-B journey an A-C ticket (at the expense of the remainder of its validity in that direction).
Afterall, it would be daft if we are permitted to use (and we are!) A-B + B-C tickets on a stopping service from A-C even if they *cheaper* than a A-C ticket for the train, but are then not be allowed to use a more *expensive* A-C ticket for A-B on the same service stopping at B. If A-B is more expensive than A-C, then that should be irrelevant, and is a flaw IMO.
We are talking about the public transport (even if operated under franchise for profit by a private company) offering deliberatly being stopped short of the kind of flexibility that private transport (a car) offers - this would be daft given the ammount of subsidy we rightly give public transport, and given the national asset that the railways represent.
But this is precisely what hidden city ticketing is. I'll grant you that airlines do not routinely seek redress in that situation (probably because they think that the cost of pursuing the matter would be excessive) but they nevertheless put that in their T&Cs and have been known in some cases to take other kind of redress and threaten to take legal action.
Back to flying, while cancellation of remaining segments will remain, I think the airlines will shortly be on very shaky ground going after people for further payment, at least within europe.
Be very careful of what you wish for. The likely net impact of such a move would be to increase fares to make up for the lost income.
As to legal development, the jurisdictions which have been most vocal and active about this are the German courts, which have held that it is illegal to force pax to use flight coupons in a ticket in a specific order. However, and this is a huge however, they nevertheless found that it was OK to charge pax for the cost of the journey with the coupons in the order in which they were used. In effect, thiey are saying that airlines can force you to pay the fare that you would have had to pay had you bought the ticket as flown in the first place.
Coming back to trains, I am very happy to live with the heavy restrictions that megatrain impose in return for paying £1 (well £1.50 if you include the booking fee) for my train fare, or to pay £11 to MAN with Virgin trains with the restrictions that go with that kind of ticket.
I would be less happy to pay more for my ticket simply because a regulator had decided that it is 'daft' not to let you get off at an earlier station.