Delay repay twice in one day?

Hiya,

I have a Weekly Season Ticket from Buckshaw Parkway to Manchester Stations.

I went to catch the 1700 train from Manchester Pic but it was cancelled due to overhead wire problems. I then got the 1719 train to Southport and alighted and Bolton where I went to catch the 1800 rail replacement bus to Buckshaw Parkway. The station staff told me there was a "mix up" and the 1800 never arrived, so I caught the 1900 rail replacement bus to Buckshaw Parkway and arrived at 1804.

Later on this evening, I needed to travel back to Manchester because I was meant to be meeting friends. I turn up for the 22:04 rail replacement bus and it never shows up and I'm told it had left 20 minutes earlier than it was supposed to.

Can I claim delay repay for twice in one day? I now cannot get to Manchester as that was my last opportunity.

startingaparty said:

Can I claim delay repay for twice in one day?

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Yes, no reason why not. Though, it seems to me like your second journey was abandoned rather than delayed.

startingaparty said:

Hiya,

I have a Weekly Season Ticket from Buckshaw Parkway to Manchester Stations.

I went to catch the 1700 train from Manchester Pic but it was cancelled due to overhead wire problems. I then got the 1719 train to Southport and alighted and Bolton where I went to catch the 1800 rail replacement bus to Buckshaw Parkway. The station staff told me there was a "mix up" and the 1800 never arrived, so I caught the 1900 rail replacement bus to Buckshaw Parkway and arrived at 1804.

Later on this evening, I needed to travel back to Manchester because I was meant to be meeting friends. I turn up for the 22:04 rail replacement bus and it never shows up and I'm told it had left 20 minutes earlier than it was supposed to.

Can I claim delay repay for twice in one day? I now cannot get to Manchester as that was my last opportunity.

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How are you getting bavk there? Rail companies have a duty to get you to your destination.

startingaparty said:

Hiya,

I have a Weekly Season Ticket from Buckshaw Parkway to Manchester Stations.

I went to catch the 1700 train from Manchester Pic but it was cancelled due to overhead wire problems. I then got the 1719 train to Southport and alighted and Bolton where I went to catch the 1800 rail replacement bus to Buckshaw Parkway. The station staff told me there was a "mix up" and the 1800 never arrived, so I caught the 1900 rail replacement bus to Buckshaw Parkway and arrived at 1804.

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Did you mean 20:04 perhaps? I didn't know time travel had been invented yet

startingaparty said:

Later on this evening, I needed to travel back to Manchester because I was meant to be meeting friends. I turn up for the 22:04 rail replacement bus and it never shows up and I'm told it had left 20 minutes earlier than it was supposed to.

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No surprise there - Northern seem to care little about ensuring their RRB providers stick to the timetable, let alone that they connect with the intended connections.

startingaparty said:

Can I claim delay repay for twice in one day? I now cannot get to Manchester as that was my last opportunity.

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There is nothing stopping you from being entitled to claim delay compensation more than once per day (subject to any limits to the total amount of compensation per day specified in the Northern Passenger Charter, e.g. some TOCs cap it at the value of that day's travel). The issue here is that you are not entitled to delay compensation if you didn't travel.

What you could of course do is to insist on onwards transport (assuming you have somewhere to stay in Manchester) or to recover the reasonable cost of your own alternative arrangements (e.g. a shared taxi) if Northern refuse to help you. You would also be able to claim delay compensation if you still travelled and made your own alternative arrangements.

For people holding an ordinary single/return ticket there is a clearly defined right to abandon your journey due to disruption, and to accordingly receive a full refund without any administration fee. Clearly, that is not practicable in the case of a season ticket, but there is no defined mechanism to provide season tickets with compensation for when they decide to abandon a journey due to disruption - the former "void day" scheme that is supposed to be somewhat of a "fix" for this having been phased out several years ago.

I would suggest writing to Northern about the latter issue separately from your delay compensation claim, asking them for compensation to the value of the abandoned journey (e.g. calculated as if it had been a 1 hour delay).

ForTheLoveOf said:

I would suggest writing to Northern about the latter issue separately from your delay compensation claim, asking them for compensation to the value of the abandoned journey (e.g. calculated as if it had been a 1 hour delay).

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Thank you for the really informative and insightful response!

Sorry, yes, I did mean 20:04!!

Okay, well, I live very near to the train station,

If you look at the departure information on National Rail Enquiries right now it says that there is a train running at 23:54. I'm going to try to catch that, I need to be in Manchester tonight really.

http://ojp.nationalrail.co.uk/service/ldbboard/dep/BSV

If this train does not run, can I ask Northern to get me to my destination on a season ticket? Bear in mind, I don't drive or anything. Would I just have to write to them separately and hope for the best?

As I understand it you would be entitled to take a taxi and claim the cost back. No doubt someone will confirm this shortly.

infobleep said:

How are you getting bavk there? Rail companies have a duty to get you to your destination.

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I haven't decided yet. The National Rail Enquiries and Northern website both show the 23:54 service to Manchester Airport as running. I'm going to attempt to catch that train.

I won't know it's running until 23:13 which is when it's supposed to depart Blackpool North.

As it's the last train of the night, do you think Northern would have made arrangements to allow it to run so as to avoid having to pay out for hotels/taxis?

EDIT:

I have just checked RealTimeTrains. The service from Manchester Airport stops at BSV. So, I think I'm correct in assuming the 2354 will stop at BSV towards Manchester. I'll keep you updated...

The 2354 is being started at Preston calling at all booked stations.

startingaparty said:

As it's the last train of the night, do you think Northern would have made arrangements to allow it to run so as to avoid having to pay out for hotels/taxis?

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Avoiding the cost of taxis or hotels is not really a consideration for most decisions on whether or not to run a train. There are far bigger penalties (financially) to cancelling a train or cancelling certain stops, both from the direct penalties for that specific cancellation as well as the impact on overall statistics.

Try the 23:54 and let us know how you got on. Was that the next service that actually ran after the one you had intended to catch? Surely not.

Yes, Northern have an obligation to get you to your destination regardless of your ticket type. If, as is unfortunately common practice from what we hear, this is refused, you can recover the reasonable cost of your own alternative arrangements (e.g. a taxi, shared where possible).

https://imgur.com/KdrDrxXI arrived at the station at 23:30. I waited for the 23:54. The train never came. I looked on both the Northern app and RealTimeTrains and suddenly the train was cancelled altogether, very last minute. See attached image of the departure board where it said it was on time..

What went on here? I really needed to be in Manchester tonight and I couldn't afford a taxi all by myself and risk Northern not paying back - I barely have enough to cover the cost of a week ticket for my commute. The ticket office was closed altogether with the gate left open to the platform. I even asked National Rail on twitter if there was definitely a train at 23:54 and they confirmed that the train would start at Preston instead. Alas, it never happened. I wish they would have just labelled it as cancelled on National Rail Enquires to save the hassle of it all!

National Rail have advised that a decision to cancel the service was made at 23:46, 2 minutes after it was meant to arrive and they advised I use the Station Help Point to help with completing my journey... but there isn't one?... Honestly, this is a shambles.

Have you tried tweeting Northern (https://twitter.com/northernassist)? (Not sure if they are open 24/7 but the last mention of it on a staff message went out at 2300 so I take it they are open late?)

If there is no help point and you can't afford to pay upfront for a taxi then unfortunately I can't think of many other methods of getting into Manchester tonight. I know it's no comfort but sometimes things don't pan out, although you will be entitled to Delay Repay. Obviously ideally Northern should lay on replacement road transport for last trains of the day or put up taxis but a lack of help points really doesn't help.

NRE says there are help points on both platforms. May be worth looking around a bit more carefully, assuming NRE are correct?

From the maps it would appear they are outside the waiting shelters on both platforms.

I was waiting for this train too.
Northern got me a taxi to Chorley and it took me to my door. Great job, really helpful.
I will also be putting two claims in as i was on the Blackpool train that caused the problems and was stuck on it for three hours.

I've never had an issue making two delay repay claims against Northern. Usually mine are for Wigan - Manchester and then Manchester - Wigan, when both out and rtn legs of my commute are delayed.
I have also previously made a delay repay claim when I couldn't travel because of cancellations due to disruption. Not the letter of the rules, I'll admit, but they happily compensated me the equivalent of a 2+ hour delay.
I'd advise you to claim delay repay with the online system then, if they don't pay out, or get the amount wrong, write to their complaints@ email address.