Hypothetical. Northern service which seems to be left in system by error

pemma · 24 May 2018

Journey planners (including Northern's own one) and RTT are showing 22:01 Northern service from Chester to Manchester as operating today, despite it not being in their strike timetable and it would be strange if it did operate as Northern don't have any Chester to Manchester services listed as running on their strike timetables at all today and the services running between Chester and Altrincham end much earlier.

From a legal prospective if that service is left in the system by error do Northern legally have to pay up for taxis even though it's not on their strike timetable?

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ForTheLoveOf · 24 May 2018

If it is the last train of the day and the passenger was not informed before relying on the alleged running, and they would ordinarily have made it to their final destination, then yes, any train company able to is obliged to arrange alternative transport and/or accomodation.

pemma · 25 May 2018

It was the last service showing and unsurprisingly it didn't run: http://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/train/Y25172/2018/05/24/advanced Although it did at least stay in the system, an earlier service which was on the strike timetable was replaced by 2 x buses and that disappeared from the system altogether.

yorkie · 25 May 2018

jcollins said:
Journey planners (including Northern's own one) and RTT are showing 22:01 Northern service from Chester to Manchester as operating today...

If you book online and obtain an itinerary, the itinerary is evidence of a contract between the customer and the train companies, and where a booked train - as shown on the itinerary - does not run in accordance with the itinerary, and the customer still wishes to travel, the relevant train companies remain contracted to convey passengers on the next available appropriate services (or alternative travel arrangements where practicable), and if this results in a delay against the original booked arrival time, delay repay is payable.

If there is absolutely no alternative arrangement available, and the company argues it is not practicable/reasonable to provide a taxi, then I am not sure what you could do about that though... maybe one day we'll have a test case?

Merseysider · 25 May 2018

yorkie said:
If there is absolutely no alternative arrangement available, and the company argues it is not practicable/reasonable to provide a taxi, then I am not sure what you could do about that though... maybe one day we'll have a test case?

My sister was booked, with reservations, to travel with GWR from Cheltenham to Paddington back in Spring when a thousand tonnes of snow screwed everything up.

GWR refused to organise any replacement transport at all for the day. In contravention of the NRCoT, Cheltenham ticket office refused to organise any road transport, despite there being a proliferation of taxis available and willing to take on jobs.

I told her to order a taxi to Reading and pick up a train there. It came to £120, and three emails later, after initially denying they had a responsibility to transport their passengers ( :lol:

) GWR sent out a cheque for £120, having admitted they had a responsibility to provide alternative transport where reasonably possible.

najaB · 26 May 2018

I agree it was poor form on GWR's part, but I just want to touch on one thing you wrote:

Merseysider said:
Cheltenham ticket office refused to organise any road transport, despite there being a proliferation of taxis available and willing to take on jobs.

I'm not saying this is necessarily the case here, but for completeness there isn't an inviolate and unconditional right to alternate ground transport. A TOC's control can determine that conditions are so bad that all travel should be abandoned and they aren't going to even attempt to arrange transport due to the risk to life and limb.

Even if that's not the case, it's not as simple as saying "There's a taxi outside, let's get it." The taxis on the station forecourt are more than likely looking for cash jobs and the booking office might not have access to petty cash, or authority to spend it on taxis.

ForTheLoveOf · 26 May 2018

najaB said:
I'm not saying this is necessarily the case here, but for completeness there isn't an inviolate and unconditional right to alternate ground transport. A TOC's control can determine that conditions are so bad that all travel should be abandoned and they aren't going to even attempt to arrange transport due to the risk to life and limb.

Even if that's not the case, it's not as simple as saying "There's a taxi outside, let's get it." The taxis on the station forecourt are more than likely looking for cash jobs and the booking office might not have access to petty cash, or authority to spend it on taxis.

NRCoT 28.2 guarantees that any train cocompany will, if it reasonably can, provide onward transport or accomodation. If there are taxis outside or hotels that are actually available, that's 'reasonably can' to me. The only kind of time where I would agree they reasonably can't is if we have conditions like March's widespread mini-blizzard.

The fact that ticket office staff don't have petty cash or authority does not change the train company's transport/accomodation obligation. It may of course have a practical impact as to whether they will abide by that obligation, but it doesn't impact the passenger's legal entitlement to demand that the train company perform their obligations, and to recover reasonable and mitigated damages/losses in lieu.

najaB · 26 May 2018

ForTheLoveOf said:
If there are taxis outside or hotels that are actually available, that's 'reasonably can' to me.

If staff in a booking office don't have cash then they can't pay cash for taxis (or for hotels that demand payment in advance).

pemma · 26 May 2018

ForTheLoveOf said:
NRCoT 28.2 guarantees that any train cocompany will, if it reasonably can, provide onward transport or accommodation. If there are taxis outside or hotels that are actually available, that's 'reasonably can' to me. The only kind of time where I would agree they reasonably can't is if we have conditions like March's widespread mini-blizzard.

The fact that ticket office staff don't have petty cash or authority does not change the train company's transport/accommodation obligation. It may of course have a practical impact as to whether they will abide by that obligation, but it doesn't impact the passenger's legal entitlement to demand that the train company perform their obligations, and to recover reasonable and mitigated damages/losses in lieu.

Don't forget (at least for now) EU law applies as well and NRCoT doesn't override that but supplements it.

If there's a large number of people it might be a logistical challenge, especially if a train has to terminate at a small village due to extreme weather and conditions don't improve. Even in the small market town where I live there would be very few hotel rooms a short walk from the station and taxis or buses would be needed if a large number of people were to be moved to hotels. There would also be a very varied standard of accommodation from a rural 4 star hotel to a Travelodge at the Motorway services.

pemma · 26 May 2018

najaB said:
If staff in a booking office don't have cash then they can't pay cash for taxis (or for hotels that demand payment in advance).

Surely they could at least sign forms which confirm the passenger has paid/will pay for a taxi from A to B or a night's stay at hotel X which the TOC will refund (and authorise their ticket to be used on the next day if applicable.)

najaB · 26 May 2018

jcollins said:
Surely they could at least sign forms which confirm the passenger has paid/will pay for a taxi from A to B or a night's stay at hotel X which the TOC will refund (and authorise their ticket to be used on the next day if applicable.)

Indeed, they could - assuming that such a form exists. I don't know if any TOCs have them (although it would be nice if they did).

Haywain · 26 May 2018

ForTheLoveOf said:
The only kind of time where I would agree they reasonably can't is if we have conditions like March's widespread mini-blizzard.

So, you agree that the TOC was right in the conditions prevailing at the time? Note the reference to whether in the post you were referring to:

Merseysider said:
My sister was booked, with reservations, to travel with GWR from Cheltenham to Paddington back in Spring when a thousand tonnes of snow screwed everything up.

jcollins said:
Surely they could at least sign forms which confirm the passenger has paid/will pay for a taxi from A to B or a night's stay at hotel X which the TOC will refund (and authorise their ticket to be used on the next day if applicable.)

Are you suggesting that staff agree that people have spent money without any evidence of them having done so? I can see that working well. In my experience most taxi drivers will dish out receipts like confetti, showing amounts that bear little resemblance to reality.

WelshBluebird · 26 May 2018

Haywain said:
In my experience most taxi drivers will dish out receipts like confetti, showing amounts that bear little resemblance to reality.

Taxi receipts are good enough to claim employee expenses back for most companies, so why are they not good enough to claim money back off a ToC?

najaB · 26 May 2018

WelshBluebird said:
Taxi receipts are good enough to claim employee expenses back for most companies, so why are they not good enough to claim money back off a ToC?

Employees have a vested interest in not *completely* taking the Michael though.

PeterC · 26 May 2018

Haywain said:
Are you suggesting that staff agree that people have spent money without any evidence of them having done so? I can see that working well. In my experience most taxi drivers will dish out receipts like confetti, showing amounts that bear little resemblance to reality.

You can buy your own pads of Licensed Taxi Reciepts from Amazon.

WelshBluebird · 26 May 2018

najaB said:
Employees have a vested interest in not *completely* taking the Michael though.

So do passengers - if they are found to be taking the mick then surely they could be done for fraud?

najaB · 26 May 2018

WelshBluebird said:
So do passengers - if they are found to be taking the mick then surely they could be done for fraud?

In theory, yes. A lot less likely though than an employee getting fired.

pemma · 26 May 2018

Haywain said:
Are you suggesting that staff agree that people have spent money without any evidence of them having done so? I can see that working well. In my experience most taxi drivers will dish out receipts like confetti, showing amounts that bear little resemblance to reality.

In the case of taxis - if they are outside the station or ordered to arrive just outside the station surely the TOC person could agree the fare with the taxi company even if they don't have means to pay for the taxi and write that amount on the form. While in the case of hotels a hotel would issue an official receipt and have a record of the stay on their system. There could be some disclaimer on the form saying in submitting the claim the TOC has the right to check with the hotel.

Anyway I'm trying to suggest a way a TOC can fulfill their legal obligations of providing taxi or hotel if they can't pay in advance. Do you have a better idea or is there already a better idea which TOCs use that I'm not aware of?

Merseysider · 26 May 2018

jcollins said:
Anyway I'm trying to suggest a way a TOC can fulfill their legal obligations of providing taxi or hotel if they can't pay in advance. Do you have a better idea or is there already a better idea which TOCs use that I'm not aware of?

Some TOCs have contracts with taxis; eg Arriva have a preferred supplier at Chester station and one call is all it takes in the event of disruption.

It’s not inconceivable that TOCs could do this with hotel chains, but I’ve never heard of it.

WelshBluebird · 26 May 2018

Certainly GWR at Exeter St Davids used to just use the taxi rank outside the station, with obviously some kind of agreement in place. My worst ever taxi journey was there actually, a delay on a Friday night meant I had a 2 hour wait for the train to Barnstaple so they put me in a taxi. Only problem was the taxi driver wanted to get back to Exeter pretty quickly with it being a Friday night and all. I very nearly threw up on getting out at Barnstaple!

DaveNewcastle · 27 May 2018

This thread seems to be another opportunity for people to reply to a question with whatever pops into their head without doing any research to find the true answer. It really undermines the value of having this section of the forum, and I can't understand why people continually want to do that.

jcollins said:
From a legal prospective if that service is left in the system by error do Northern legally have to pay up for taxis even though it's not on their strike timetable?

There is NO legal obligation for any UK Railway Company to pay for a taxi to carry any passenger anywhere.
So let's not start any further discussion that presumes this obligation is correct.

A journey which is "in the system" (whatever that means for a rail traveller is unclear from your question) does not create an obligation to convey a person anywhere. Passenger Rail travel in the UK is based on the legal principles of a Contract. A Contract is formed when a passenger buys a ticket (and there are other less common 'implied contracts' when a passenger travels without a ticket but with explicit permission of some form or other). Once the Contract is formed, the Railway Company(s) is bound to convey the passenger to the destination on the Contract.

There is NOTHING in those contracts which requires that journey to be by train. And, there is nothing in that contract which requires any rail Company to "pay up for" any transport which their contracted passenger has chosen to find by way of another Contract with anyone else (such as a taxi driver). It is only for the Railway Company, and could only ever be for the Railway Company, to choose how to convey their contracted passenger.

Hope this helps.

As for extreme circumstances such as hazardous conditions, then it would be arguably correct for the Contract to be interpreted in the context of those conditions, and in such circumstances, the parties to the Contract may be permitted to relax certain terms if they had become impossible, hazardous or unreasonable to fulfill.

Starmill · 27 May 2018

When there is a strike on, Northern have taken the view with me in the past that the evening services are cancelled, and if you wanted to use one you are out of luck. In my case I had a ticket booked before the strike was announced for a final service of the day. However, the train was cancelled with no alternative trains, no rail replacement buses, no ticket acceptance on the local buses or indeed the local tram service (both of which were running normally at the time I was booked to travel), and they refused to organise a taxi. The only available options were to travel early or to apply for a refund.

This seems to be their company policy in these situations. If that's not accurate then I would love to know more, but that is what happened to me.

Starmill · 27 May 2018

DaveNewcastle said:
There is NO legal obligation for any UK Railway Company to pay for a taxi to carry any passenger anywhere.

Where was this claim made?

DaveNewcastle said:
There is NOTHING in those contracts which requires that journey to be by train.

Again, who made this claim? I don't see it in this thread. Perhaps I'm missing something obvious. Your capitalisation here certainly suggests so.

DaveNewcastle said:
A Contract is formed when a passenger buys a ticket

I agree.

DaveNewcastle said:
It is only for the Railway Company, and could only ever be for the Railway Company, to choose how to convey their contracted passenger.

Quite. This thread is about circumstances when the railway company chooses not to convey the passenger who has bought a ticket. I had thought that was relatively clear.

pemma · 27 May 2018

DaveNewcastle said:
This thread seems to be another opportunity for people to reply to a question with whatever pops into their head without doing any research to find the true answer. It really undermines the value of having this section of the forum, and I can't understand why people continually want to do that.There is NO legal obligation for any UK Railway Company to pay for a taxi to carry any passenger anywhere.
So let's not start any further discussion that presumes this obligation is correct.

A journey which is "in the system" (whatever that means for a rail traveller is unclear from your question) does not create an obligation to convey a person anywhere. Passenger Rail travel in the UK is based on the legal principles of a Contract. A Contract is formed when a passenger buys a ticket (and there are other less common 'implied contracts' when a passenger travels without a ticket but with explicit permission of some form or other). Once the Contract is formed, the Railway Company(s) is bound to convey the passenger to the destination on the Contract.

There is NOTHING in those contracts which requires that journey to be by train. And, there is nothing in that contract which requires any rail Company to "pay up for" any transport which their contracted passenger has chosen to find by way of another Contract with anyone else (such as a taxi driver). It is only for the Railway Company, and could only ever be for the Railway Company, to choose how to convey their contracted passenger.

In the case of the scenario described in the original post journey planners (including the one's on Northern's site) were showing a last service which didn't operate. EU law requires train, ferry and coach operators to either arrange alternative transport or put passengers in the hotel for the night in the event of that happening, even EU law suggests alternative transport is the preferred option. Because the last service showing in journey planners wasn't shown on the pdfs or print outs showing the strike timetable it's unlikely that more than an odd passenger would have turned up for it. I accept passengers don't have the right to say to Northern - I don't want to catch the replacement bus you're organising, I want a taxi instead or alternatively say I want to stay in a hotel tonight and take the first train home tomorrow if they've offered alternative transport. However, in the circumstances described taxis for anyone who did plan to catch the non-existent last train would have been the most sensible way of Northern fulfilling their obligation of getting the passengers home.

The problem with the above is for Northern to arrange an alternative contact with a member of staff needs to be made and even if contact can be made, it's probable the staff member (who may be in Northern's 'customer experience centre') will likely argue no such service was on the strike timetable and consequently refuse to help the passenger, meaning the passenger has to try and claim back out-of-pocket costs afterwards.

tiptoptaff · 27 May 2018

Although off topic, for clarity - GWR use what are called "white tickets" to use taxis off the rank - but even these must be approved suppliers. However, they don't always accept them. Then there's nothing we can do. I worked most of the blizzard days and our taxi suppliers were refusing jobs. The bus suppliers were also refusing jobs. Hotels were full. There wasn't much more we could do beyond what we were doing. As a result a decision was taken to suspend all road transport including off the rank.

IanXC · 27 May 2018

WelshBluebird said:
Taxi receipts are good enough to claim employee expenses back for most companies, so why are they not good enough to claim money back off a ToC?

I think Haywain was making a general observation about taxi receipts. I don't think anyone has ever suggested they're not good enough to make a claim with, so I don't know where you got that from.

najaB · 27 May 2018

Starmill said:
This thread is about circumstances when the railway company chooses not to convey the passenger who has bought a ticket.

Well, to be accurate, it's about a hypothetical situation where a passenger was inadvertently sold a ticket and given an itinerary to travel on a service that the TOC didn't plan to run.

lejog · 2 Jun 2018

DaveNewcastle said:
This thread seems to be another opportunity for people to reply to a question with whatever pops into their head without doing any research to find the true answer. It really undermines the value of having this section of the forum, and I can't understand why people continually want to do that.There is NO legal obligation for any UK Railway Company to pay for a taxi to carry any passenger anywhere.
So let's not start any further discussion that presumes this obligation is correct.

A journey which is "in the system" (whatever that means for a rail traveller is unclear from your question) does not create an obligation to convey a person anywhere. Passenger Rail travel in the UK is based on the legal principles of a Contract. A Contract is formed when a passenger buys a ticket (and there are other less common 'implied contracts' when a passenger travels without a ticket but with explicit permission of some form or other). Once the Contract is formed, the Railway Company(s) is bound to convey the passenger to the destination on the Contract.

There is NOTHING in those contracts which requires that journey to be by train. And, there is nothing in that contract which requires any rail Company to "pay up for" any transport which their contracted passenger has chosen to find by way of another Contract with anyone else (such as a taxi driver). It is only for the Railway Company, and could only ever be for the Railway Company, to choose how to convey their contracted passenger.

Hope this helps.

As for extreme circumstances such as hazardous conditions, then it would be arguably correct for the Contract to be interpreted in the context of those conditions, and in such circumstances, the parties to the Contract may be permitted to relax certain terms if they had become impossible, hazardous or unreasonable to fulfill.

Have you considered the Consumer Contracts Act 2015 in this reply, which now applies to the railways in full?

It allows for anything said or written by the trader or by the trader's agent about the service, if it is taken into account by the consumer upon entering the contract, to be treated as a term of the contract.

In this case, I would have thought the appearance of the service on the TOC's website, if this leads to the purchase of a ticket would lead to the service being incorporated into the contract. But in general the existence of a train in a timetable, on a journey planner whenever does become part of the contract.

Unfortunately the CCA won't help with damages like taxi fares.

DaveNewcastle · 4 Jun 2018

lejog said:
Have you considered the Consumer Contracts Act 2015 in this reply, which now applies to the railways in full?

It allows for anything said or written by the trader or by the trader's agent about the service, if it is taken into account by the consumer upon entering the contract, to be treated as a term of the contract.

In this case, I would have thought the appearance of the service on the TOC's website . . . . .

I have.
It appears to me that you and I have drawn a differing understanding of how the Courts are interpreting and applying the Act and its impact on existing Contract Law. So be it.

lejog said:
Unfortunately the CCA won't help with damages like taxi fares.

I'm not sure why one would think of the Act as 'unfortunate'in this respect, nor why you consider a taxi fare could be assessed as anything other than 'compensation', though perhaps you were thinking of 'damages' purely as compensatory, or, when finding it 'unfortunate', you would wish classes of suppliers, producers, consumers, service providers, skilled workers, creative workers and manufacturers to provide financial compensation for most forms of consequential losses from unmet expectations?
That is exactly what is happening to, on the one hand, the UK health service with claims by patients, and on the other, insurance companies with false claims by their insured. Both of these challenges are proving to be very costly. I'm sure the same costs would have to be generated from rail fares if your expectations for passengers' 'compensation' or 'damages' were to become true.

Deerfold · 8 Jun 2018

Starmill said:
When there is a strike on, Northern have taken the view with me in the past that the evening services are cancelled, and if you wanted to use one you are out of luck. In my case I had a ticket booked before the strike was announced for a final service of the day. However, the train was cancelled with no alternative trains, no rail replacement buses, no ticket acceptance on the local buses or indeed the local tram service (both of which were running normally at the time I was booked to travel), and they refused to organise a taxi. The only available options were to travel early or to apply for a refund.

This seems to be their company policy in these situations. If that's not accurate then I would love to know more, but that is what happened to me.

I've had that when booked on a connecting service on the 1833 out of Kings Cross onto a Northern service to Keighley. Northern said they had no obligation to convey me and I should travel earlier. VTEC said I could not travel earlier nor have a refund as they were running their servrvice. Northern said I should buy another ticket from London if I wanted to travel (but they would not refund me, nor would they pay for or organise alternative transport). Eventually, with personal intervention from David Horne, I was given permission to travel on the direct 1803 from Kings Cross to Keighley (the guard on that train said they'd have allowed me to travel anyway as otherwise I could not complete my journey, but every other interaction with VTEC had said I would not).

Hypothetical. Northern service which seems to be left in system by error

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