Delay Repay - Missed Connection

I had an advance ticket yesterday from Ashford International (AFK) to Leuchars (LEU) via Edinburgh (EDB)

Ashford to London was fine, but the 1200 from Kings Cross was 24 minutes late into Edinburgh, meaning I missed the 10 minute connection for 16:30 to Leuchars.

The next Leuchars train was at 17:02 arriving 2 minutes late in Leuchars at 18:13.

So no train was individually or cumulatively more than 30 minutes late (24 mins & 2 mins), but the impact on my total journey was a delay of 47 minutes on the planned arrival of 17:25 at Leuchars.

I would like to know if i have an eligible delay repay case and who I should claim from?

I bought the ticket through Virgin Trains East Coast and the London -> Edinburgh was with VTEC, but the last leg was with ScotRail. Seems to me VTEC would logically be the people to claim from.

it’s the delay to your overall journey that counts.

You claim from the TOC that caused the delay, in this case VTEC.

Agreed with Hadders. Claim from VTEC for the overall delay, not individual legs.

I had a similar one at new year. My ticket was a 1st advance single from Euston to WIndermere.
The train arrived at Oxenholme 14 minutes late so missed the onward connection for Windermere by 90 seconds. I had to wait 62 minutes for the next one. Final arrival in Windermere was 63 minutes late.
I received an email from VT customer relations this morning saying that as I arrived at Oxenholme 14 minutes late they do not consider this a valid claim. I have replied disputing this and quoting page 9 of the VT passenger charter which states if the delay is to the overall journey.

It's very clear-cut; Virgin Trains East Coast are liable for Delay Repay of 50% of the cost of the journey from Ashford to Leuchars, which was 47 minutes late.

philjo said:

I had a similar one at new year. My ticket was a 1st advance single from Euston to WIndermere.
The train arrived at Oxenholme 14 minutes late so missed the onward connection for Windermere by 90 seconds. I had to wait 62 minutes for the next one. Final arrival in Windermere was 63 minutes late.
I received an email from VT customer relations this morning saying that as I arrived at Oxenholme 14 minutes late they do not consider this a valid claim. I have replied disputing this and quoting page 9 of the VT passenger charter which states if the delay is to the overall journey.

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Yes, Virgin Trains like to do this. I'm aware of about 6 cases now. I am looking into getting solicitors involved (at no cost to any passenger); please do contact me if you'd like to be included.

Yes I too have noticed that Virgin Trains West Coast are taking this approach a lot, along with denying customers their split ticket rights. I have always been able to get them to pay up in the end (usually to the full value of the ticket as enhanced compensation for first refusing to pay out) so sadly I have nothing to be included at the moment otherwise I would have loved to have been.

yorkie said:

It's very clear-cut; Virgin Trains East Coast are liable for Delay Repay of 50% of the cost of the journey from Ashford to Leuchars, which was 47 minutes late.


Yes, Virgin Trains like to do this. I'm aware of about 6 cases now. I am looking into getting solicitors involved (at no cost to any passenger); please do contact me if you'd like to be included.

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Yes, please. I have sent a PM with details.

philjo Did you fill out the Delay Repay form or did you send an email. For anything no so straight forward I find it is better to send an email to Virgin Trains West Coast. In your case, give you have tried to claim already and will have attached copies of your tickets, send an email to [email protected] quoting your case reference number. Ask them to look and their decision again and explain to them why you are entitled to compensation.

gcmozart I would recommend that you claim by email rather then an online form to contact Virgin Trains East Coast. Send an email, remembering to attach your tickets, to [email protected] You do not need to explain where you brought the ticket from or who operates the service into London or the connecting service. All you need to say is that the 12:00 Virgin Trains East Coast service from London Kings Cross to Edinburgh was delayed by 24 minutes. This caused you to miss your connecting service 16:30 and you had to wait for the next service to Leuchars so did not arrive at your destination until 18:17 a total of 47 minutes late.

gcmozart said:

I had an advance ticket yesterday from Ashford International (AFK) to Leuchars (LEU) via Edinburgh (EDB)

Ashford to London was fine, but the 1200 from Kings Cross was 24 minutes late into Edinburgh, meaning I missed the 10 minute connection for 16:30 to Leuchars.

The next Leuchars train was at 17:02 arriving 2 minutes late in Leuchars at 18:13.

So no train was individually or cumulatively more than 30 minutes late (24 mins & 2 mins), but the impact on my total journey was a delay of 47 minutes on the planned arrival of 17:25 at Leuchars.

I would like to know if i have an eligible delay repay case and who I should claim from?

I bought the ticket through Virgin Trains East Coast and the London -> Edinburgh was with VTEC, but the last leg was with ScotRail. Seems to me VTEC would logically be the people to claim from.

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Virgin normally consider the delay per ticket if you choose to purchase split tickets, so your claim is likely to be refused. This is at odds with other train companies, but Transport Focus has backed them up in the past.

island said:

Virgin normally consider the delay per ticket if you choose to purchase split tickets, so your claim is likely to be refused. This is at odds with other train companies, but Transport Focus has backed them up in the past.

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Nope bought one advance ticket for the whole journey & bought it through the VTEC website.

Email sent to cust services as per the advice up thread - will wait and see the outcome.

gcmozart said:

Nope bought one advance ticket for the whole journey & bought it through the VTEC website.

Email sent to cust services as per the advice up thread - will wait and see the outcome.

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Sorry, I misread the OP as saying you had separate tickets. There is no question you should be compensated based on the throughout journey in this case.

gray1404 said:

For anything no so straight forward I find it is better to send an email to Virgin Trains West Coast.

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My advice is always to email your delay repay claim where your journey includes a leg not on the Virgin Trains network - do not use the online form.

The online form for delay repay claims will not recognise stations not served by Virgin, forcing the customer to enter only the Virgin Trains element on their journey (in this case Oxenholme), even if this is not the final destination of their journey. One assumes the information put into the online form is then used to assess the claim, without any due regard for the actual journey undertaken, and thus is routinely dismissed as failing to meet the criteria.

This might be an oversight on Virgin Trains' part when they designed the system. Through the lack of any fix being applied despite it being brought to their attention constantly over at least a two year period suggests a more negligent attitude...

I think negligent is being nice to them. I've multiple times reported the fact that it says on their website that the only way to change the route on a walk-up ticket is to refund against £10 and replace, which is patently false, and I suspect it is deliberate that this is the case.

I have just "Discussed" this on webchat with Virgin West Coast delay when using split tickets. They were adamant they are not paying stating "I can confirm that the compensation is correct, as the first leg of journey was not delayed and you have two advanced singles you are not entitled to any compensation for the first ticket,"

To add in my own experience with VTEC recently, and to seek some advice, I have this tale:

Travelling from York to Bath Spa a couple of weekends ago, I was booked on a VTEC service from York to Doncaster, then Cross Country down to Bristol Temple Meads, before the final hop with GWR to Bath Spa (the last train of the day). The Virgin service was delayed by 18 minutes getting into Doncaster, meaning a missed connection and a 30 minute wait for the following XC service. This ultimately meant that I missed my connection at Bristol -- the final train of the day from Temple Meads to Bath Spa. Taxis arranged by the staff at Temple Meads, and back to Bath just after midnight, with a delay of around 35 minutes.

Delay repay duly filed online with VTEC. I'd read some of the comments here about them being funny about missed connections, but tried anyway -- after all, my journey started in the VTEC network (York - Doncaster), and it was a 'through' ticket (not split), and my uploaded photo included my seat reservations. However, yesterday I got a denied claim back, claiming that "First Great Western are responsible for your experience and any recompense due". Which feels a bit far fetched unless they were expected to hold their train at Bristol for over 10 minutes! (And also that, as far as I'm aware, they haven't traded under that name for several years?)

The email goes on to suggest that the claim has been forwarded to FGW. What's the best way of responding to this -- can these emails be replied to or do they disappear down a black hole, meaning I should start a fresh claim, referencing the previous one?

stanpotts said:

The email goes on to suggest that the claim has been forwarded to FGW. What's the best way of responding to this -- can these emails be replied to or do they disappear down a black hole, meaning I should start a fresh claim, referencing the previous one?

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Some emails do get ignored. I once had ATW telling me something was Northern's responsibility (when it was ATW's) and saying the email had been forwarded on to Northern and similar experiences with EMT, Virgin and TPE - although in the case of the latter a further email to TPE did see TPE respond to the issue that was their responsibility. In most cases I heard nothing back from the operator who the email had been forwarded on to, except Northern who sent me a generic response which didn't answer anything.

You should have a case number for your claim. There should be a way to reply to the email using that case number in the subject line (or sending a new email including it) to politely explain to them they have made a mistake and could they look into this further. I don’t think you’d have to escalate it further but be prepared to if necessary.
I’ve recently been overpaid in RTV for a claim from VTEC for some odd wording and reasoning they gave in their letter that I cannot understand. I have contacted them to tell them this as it’s not an insignificant amount but have yet to get a reply.

I got notification today from VTEC that they will be paying me 50% refund on my whole journey.

Thanks for all the help & guidance.

Just a quick update from me -- I've now had a response from VTEC, and I've been given rail travel vouchers for 25% of my whole journey, with a note apologising for the delay due to a high volume of claims (although nothing about my initial rejection). Thanks to all for your advice.

Ah, so that's 50% of the relevant portion, so the correct amount

Good to hear.

I’ve had a missed connection recently at Doncaster (late-running train from KGX) causing me to be about an hour late into Sheffield. Same issue as above, I have been refused as the delay didn’t come from the late-running train itself. It’s interesting to note that the VTEC website makes no mention at all about payments due to missed connections. As far as I can tell, their “passenger charter” does not either.

I’ve written to their customer relations mailbox but have heard nothing other than the usual “we’ll get back to you in ten working days”, which they certainly have not.

From reading through this discussion it sounds like tweeting them would be an exercise in futility.

philjo said:

I had a similar one at new year. My ticket was a 1st advance single from Euston to WIndermere.
The train arrived at Oxenholme 14 minutes late so missed the onward connection for Windermere by 90 seconds. I had to wait 62 minutes for the next one. Final arrival in Windermere was 63 minutes late.
I received an email from VT customer relations this morning saying that as I arrived at Oxenholme 14 minutes late they do not consider this a valid claim. I have replied disputing this and quoting page 9 of the VT passenger charter which states if the delay is to the overall journey.

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UPDATE: I had sent another email in January to VT Customer services disputing their original reply. Other than a new reference number I heard nothing. Last week I received a letter in the post with a cheque for the full cost of this ticket - 5 months after submitting the original claim.