No cheap train trips for the young or the poor?

Under-18s (and some people on low incomes) are being prevented from buying lower-priced rail tickets

If it's not easy to get to a staffed railway station (and from where I live the nearest is a 30-mile round trip), then travelling any distance by train affordably means that you are going to have to book in advance, online - it can cost nine times as much if you just show up at the station and buy a "walk-up" ticket.

But if you are under 18, you can't. Nor can you if you are a migrant worker who can't yet open a proper bank or credit card account. Or just someone who doesn't feel they want to risk running up a debt.

Why, because Trainline (the quasi-monopolist who run the largest online website, and provide the engine for every other service, as far as I can see) won't accept Maestro Solo or Visa Electron cards online. And those are the only cards that an under-18 (or someone without a credit history) is likely to be offered by a bank.

Why? Trainline only reveal "This is due to the nature of these cards, which are issued under different agreements." - not exactly illuminating.

My guess is that the acceptance procedure is more complicated: these cards don't allow you to overdraw, so authorisation requires a realtime check with the issuing bank - they need to confirm that there is enough in the account to pay for the transaction. And that seems to be more effort than Trainline can be bothered with.

It is clearly possible to manage online purchases with these cards - teenagers are happily buying lots of online stuff with these cards.

If Trainline were one of several alternative online booking systems, it might be OK to let market economics persuade them that they would lose business to a competitor that was willing to take the trouble to get their systems working with these cards.

But as a quasi-monopolist, Trainline's laziness is more of a worry.

Banks spend a small fortune subsidising children's accounts - to get them settled as customers at a young age. The BBC used to give out free "Radio 4 sampler" tapes to new students for the same purpose.

We need to encourage youngsters to get familiar with booking a train trip when they want to travel.

So shouldn't someone be kicking bottoms at Trainline to stop them actively preventing youngsters from using our trains?