Returning an unused ticket

Evening all,

A story from A to Z...

I bought two Off Peak Priv Returns last month for a trip between London Euston and Lancaster at Norwich station on my debit card. I left the tickets in Norwich at my parents in error. By the time I realised this I had driven back to London and as travel was for the next day I bought the same tickets again but this time in London, with a view to returning the original ones once I had got them back from my parents in Norwich.

My brother kindly offered to take them back to Norwich station for me on his way through but got to the ticket office at closing so they said come back another time. He took the tickets back to Sheffield and has tried returning them there but to no luck. The ticket office in Sheffield has said as they are operated by East Midlands Trains they cannot refund the ticket as they can't get the money back themselves. I'm surprised by this but fully accept I don't understand the intricacies of ticket return.

Complicated by the fact that my brother is trying to return my train tickets at a different station without my debit card, i've suggested he posts them to me in London and I can at least have a go with my debit card though if it does have to be at a station that is operated by the same TOC as they were purchased (or even the same station) am I best sending them to my parents in Norwich to be refunded? Obviously they don't have my bank card though...

I'm rapidly approaching my 28 day limit on them!

Sorry about the rambling story

Sheffield may not have been able to refund them, in which case, they should be able to accept these tickets for refund and forward to the retailer to avoid inconveniencing the customer.

bb21 said:

Sheffield may not have been able to refund them, in which case, they should be able to accept these tickets for refund and forward to the retailer to avoid inconveniencing the customer.

Click to expand...

Hmmm. Well, that wasn't offered so they're in the post now. Hopefully I can sort it. I'd assumed it would be quite straight forward as the tickets were bought in a station but obviously not. Mind you, I have made it more complicated admittedly!

bb21 said:

Sheffield may not have been able to refund them, in which case, they should be able to accept these tickets for refund and forward to the retailer to avoid inconveniencing the customer.

Click to expand...

Just the first word explains the problem. The ticket office there is notorious for providing poor customer service.

To be honest, even though technically any ticket office can accept a refund, it is a bit of a battle even from the inside and then it is just taken out the front and put in the post, if it were me sending those tickets off personally I would send it myself to get some sort of proof of postage or hand it in at a station operated by the same TOC myself!

The best thing to do would be to send them to Customer Relations at Greater Anglia, the train company that operates Norwich station. They will then either send you a cheque or forward it to Passenger Accounts to process a refund and send you a cheque. Alternatively, I once sent some tickets back to a TOC and said I would be happy to receive my refund in Rail Travel Vouchers if it would help them and speed up the process and they gladly sent such.

They should not send a cheque, the refund should be back to the card used for payment.

Can they still do that without the card to put the money back onto if the tickets are posted back.

Some retail systems will 'remember' the card details but in other cases it is necessary to contact the cardholder to obtain the details by phone. Under PCI/DSS rules it is not permitted to retain or transmit (by post) full card numbers. Of course, here and in another thread, some would have us believe there are no cost implications to this.

Thanks for all the advice guys. Ok, well I finally have the tickets in my possession now i'm home from work. Today is Day 28 and as I understand it the last day I can get a refund?

The nearest Greater Anglia station is Tottenham Hale which will be closed by the time I get there. I'm trying to avoid having to go to Liverpool Street this evening!

If it can wait until tomorrow, i'll go to Tottenham Hale and presumably they can do it there and then? If it can be any TOC then i'll go to Finsbury Park as I go through there on my way to work.

Otherwise, I can send them to Norwich station.

Best course of action?

The 28 days is from the expiry date of the validity of the return portion of the ticket, so if you bought them in December you have some time in hand yet as that time cannot run out for at least 3 days (January 28th at the very earliest).