Lost Property

Hello everyone - searching on this forum I can see this is quite a common question, but I was just wondering if anyone could offer more educated advice, or an opinion on my chances at recovering a lost item.

Travelling on a Northern Rail Service from Newton-Le-Willows to Manchester Oxford Road on 19/08/19, I rather stupidly left a rucksack containing a few items of great personal importance (namely, my degree and A-Level certificates!) under my seat as I departed. I have since found out that the train continued on to Crewe, (arriving at 13:40), but my call to their station was fruitless as the train did not terminate there - although the two members of staff offered conflicting opinions as to where the train would terminate (either at Manchester Piccadilly or Liverpool Lime Street).

I've since filed reports with both Piccadilly and Lime Street's lost property office, but I was wondering when I should write off my chances and get my certificates replaced. Or, what would happen if a passenger had taken the bag off and handed it in at a smaller station. Would it be any use ringing these stations - or is lost property sent somewhere more central anyway? Alternatively, since I know what time I left the bag, is there any precedent for looking at the CCTV on the train and seeing what happened to it?

Thanks in Advance!

Have you contacted Northern direct?
https://www.northernrailway.co.uk/travel/lost-property

30907 said:

Have you contacted Northern direct?
https://www.northernrailway.co.uk/travel/lost-property

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Yes I’ve logged it with their service. If nothings shown up yet can I assume it’s gone or is that premature?

bwfcjosh said:

Hello everyone - searching on this forum I can see this is quite a common question, but I was just wondering if anyone could offer more educated advice, or an opinion on my chances at recovering a lost item.

Travelling on a Northern Rail Service from Newton-Le-Willows to Manchester Oxford Road on 19/08/19, I rather stupidly left a rucksack containing a few items of great personal importance (namely, my degree and A-Level certificates!) under my seat as I departed. I have since found out that the train continued on to Crewe, (arriving at 13:40), but my call to their station was fruitless as the train did not terminate there - although the two members of staff offered conflicting opinions as to where the train would terminate (either at Manchester Piccadilly or Liverpool Lime Street).

I've since filed reports with both Piccadilly and Lime Street's lost property office, but I was wondering when I should write off my chances and get my certificates replaced. Or, what would happen if a passenger had taken the bag off and handed it in at a smaller station. Would it be any use ringing these stations - or is lost property sent somewhere more central anyway? Alternatively, since I know what time I left the bag, is there any precedent for looking at the CCTV on the train and seeing what happened to it?

Thanks in Advance!

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Have you tried contacting Virgin Trains lost property https://www.virgintrains.co.uk/help-and-contact/lost-property as they manage Crewe station and from what I can see the train did actually terminate at Crewe.

The staff may have thought that you were referring to the London NW Railway service from Liverpool which arrives in Crewe at a similar time but terminates in London.

Might also be worth trying Warrington Bank Quay as the train does spend about 30 minutes there later in the day - enough time for someone to do a quick sweep.

Wilmslow is another one worth trying as it terminates their late evening before finally returning to Manchester Piccadilly then onwards to the depot.

Hope you manage to find your bag and its contents.

bwfcjosh said:

Yes I’ve logged it with their service. If nothings shown up yet can I assume it’s gone or is that premature?

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Lost property can take a while to get to the central logging hub, I'd not give up yet.

Tried to get in touch with Crewe earlier today through Virgin but weirdly their phone lines are disconnected

Might it be worth going in person and asking them to have a look in lost property?

bwfcjosh said:

Tried to get in touch with Crewe earlier today through Virgin but weirdly their phone lines are disconnected

Might it be worth going in person and asking them to have a look in lost property?

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It's probably worth a go.

I had this discussion recently at a Southern Meet the Manager session. I left an umbrella on the train on a day when it wasn't raining. As it wasn't raining I didn't realise for a couple of days and whilst it has been reported and if logged properly should be identifiable as it had corporate branding on it. However there has been no sign of it. The question is of course where does this sort of stuff go, is it being taken by other passengers, borrowed by staff, just not being logged properly etc.

Valuable stuff does seem to often be recovered, and of course if really valuable and someone steals it relatively regularly the crooks seem to get caught.

To give faith a fellow commuter left his bicycle helmet on the train last night, I suggested he went back to the station to intercept the same train on its later journey, sure enough his cycle helmet was where he left it. The same chap left his laptop on a train to Brighton some months ago. A tweet to Southern revealed the train was checked, no laptop. Shortly followed by another response that it had just been handed in by a passenger. SO stuff does get retrieved

If you left it under the seat then might not have been found until the end of day clean when back at the depot in Liverpool.

If the worst comes to the worst, I believe that exam boards (or their successors where they have merged) will reissue A Level certificates at a (fairly substantial) cost, and I think it's likely that your university will do the same.

Fawkes Cat said:

If the worst comes to the worst, I believe that exam boards (or their successors where they have merged) will reissue A Level certificates at a (fairly substantial) cost, and I think it's likely that your university will do the same.

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And if not, they should be able to provide a signed official statement of results that would likely be accepted equally in most cases.

I left a pair of glasses on a 390 , made every effort to get them found , to no avail. I suspect they and the case had fallen under a seat. One would expect some effort to log them and hand them in.

Cost me an expensive trip to the opticians.

Winter's day, I took an early morning service from Waterloo to Bracknell for a business meeting. A 458 in their first time around. Walking into the meeting room I realised I had left my expensive and recently purchased scarf in the overhead rack of the train. Annoying.

Mid afternoon I went back to Bracknell station. 8-car rolls in headed back to Waterloo. Board at nearest door, sit down, thinking about the Waterloo lost property office. Then it occurs to me, I wonder if this just might be the same train and it hasn't been cleared. Hmmm. 458s have (had) glass overhead racks. I looked down the length of the carriage. There, at the other end, just about where I had been sat in the coach coming out, was a shadow. Stride down there, look up - and there it is. Not just the same train, but I had sat in the same carriage. It was on its third round trip between Waterloo and Reading.

Nobody more surprised than me - except the lady who was sat in the seat underneath as I retrieved it!!!

Something like a rucksack will generally be found and logged as it's big enough to potentially be a security issue. The problem is divining where it may end and allowing a day or two for it to work it's way through sitting in an office before going on the computer etc. Some maintenance depots send property up weekly to be logged.

This is particularly complicated at locations where the station operator and the train operator differ or there are third parties like the Left Luggage Company involved. Another possibility is the guard may take the bag with them to their home depot, whether that may be.

I would leave it a few days then relog it with Virgin (Crewe station), Northern (train operator) and Left Luggage Company (lost property at Manchester Piccadilly and Liverpool Lime Street).

Briefly regarding things like umbrellas - railway offices up and down the country are littered with thousands of the things that by and large no one ever comes back for. If you leave it at a station the staff will probably keep hold of it for a while. On a train, anything could happen to it during the course of the day as it's quite hard at times to even note that they aren't the property of the person they are adjacent to and to be honest, for right or wrong, cleaners might take it off but guards generally won't want to bother carrying it about until it can be booked in.

LowLevel said:

Briefly regarding things like umbrellas - railway offices up and down the country are littered with thousands of the things that by and large no one ever comes back for.

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When open top sightseeing buses started up in Edinburgh, to cater for sudden bad weather during the trip they were each kitted out with 50 or so umbrellas loaned from the lost property department.

Knight1645 said:

When it's gone-it's gone

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It often isn't actually. I've found and had handed into me everything from wallets full of money, to phones, to hats, to bags to passports to wedding rings. It's always worth checking!

Knight1645 said:

When it's gone-it's gone

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I left a camera on a train at Shepherds Bush - the train terminated at the next stop Willesden Junction. I got to Willesden Junction before the train came back out the reversing siding and obviously the camera was nowhere to be seen on the train and the station staff hadn't had it handed in.

When it's gone... it's definitely gone