Delay Repay claims rejected

[Deltic1961]

Sadly this is endemic in how businesses in the UK are ran nowadays. Nobody gives a hoot and it's all about profit and "shareholder value". The customer is a long way down the list of considerations.

Ever tried claiming on an insurance policy or getting something repaired under warranty?

 

[robbeech]

Ever tried claiming on an insurance policy or getting something repaired under warranty?

Yes, and always have a much higher success rate than delay repay claims and much generally better customer service than the railway but YMMV.

 

[trenopendo]

Moreover, insurers are regulated by the Financial Ombudsman. Whilst I have been disappointed by how long they take to look at cases, they charge medium/large businesses some 700 GBP for each case they received. Thus, there is an incentive (however minor) to fix things before they reach that stage.

Perhaps the Rail Ombudsman should start doing the same.

 

[robbeech]

Perhaps the Rail Ombudsman should start doing the same.

I was under the impression that there was a charge, although i could be wrong. The difference appears to be the Rail Ombudsman doesn't have many people that know the rules, instead looking to the operators to provide details of the rules. If operators knew and obeyed the rules there would be no need for the Ombudsman so to look to them for the rules is lunacy.

"Oi, Dave, do you owe Gerald £10 or £20?"

What is Dave going to say, given zero repercussions of claiming the lower amount?

 

[Dood75]

My wife is still waiting on a claim for a full refund from CrossCountry submitted on 8 December 2021....with no communication whatsoever from them...initially told could take up to 20 working days

 

[Haywain]

My wife is still waiting on a claim for a full refund from CrossCountry submitted on 8 December 2021....with no communication whatsoever from them...initially told could take up to 20 working days

And today is around 22 working days, assuming Monday to Friday, so you probably need to give it another week or do before chasing.

 

[stew]

I find Northern tend to accept or reject within 7 days, and then slightly quicker if you join the appeal route.

 

[Neil Polo]

I’ve had a delay refund rejected by Avanti because I only included the delayed leg of my journey in the application. I assumed that parts of the journey not to do with Avanti would be irrelevant. Why do they need the whole journey to process a claim on a delayed leg?
Suppose I’d only bothered to make part of the journey using that ticket, if there’s a delay on that leg it shouldn’t really matter about the rest of the journey, should it?

 

[allotments]

The delay is calculated on the whole journey end to end compared to expected schedule. If part of the journey is delayed, sometimes time is made up later or more time lost depending on connections etc. So you do need to specify the whole journey that you made and calculate any delay based on that.

 

[Neil Polo]

Ah ok. Thanks.

 

[allotments]

If your ticket(s) allows break of journey you could break this into multiple journeys, pausing after each journey and continuing with a new journey later.

So you might actually end up only claiming for a delayed leg because that leg was one of the multiple journeys that you made!

So if you have tickets from London to Liverpool for example and you travelled London to Crewe then went shopping, taking another train to Liverpool later, that's broken into 2 journeys when considering whether delay repay might apply.

If the journey leg Euston to Crewe was delayed you could claim for that journey, using times between Euston and Crewe. That would likely be one leg of the whole journey covered by the ticket to Liverpool.

I hope that doesn't cause confusion

 

[Neil Polo]

That’s logical. Indeed that’s what I thought I was doing at the time.
By break journey, do you mean on different days? I suppose I could claim it as an independent part of the journey.

 

[allotments]

If the ticket remains valid over several days the broken journey can be continued later same day or another day. That's up to you. Simply claim for what actually happened.

 

[gray1404]

Northern are currently taking around 5 to 7 days to process claims and then a further full week for free tickets to arrive in the post

 

[ABB125]

This isn't quit on topic, but is related to delay repay and isn't worth a new thread. Sorry!

Last summer I was delayed on a train. I applied for delay repay, and was sent a voucher. When I tried to use it, it didn't work. I emailed GWR (the issuer), and eventually they replied, basically saying "that's fine, we'll send you a replacement voucher". There was some rather dodgy wording in the emails, which suggested I needed to post them my existing voucher, cut in half, which I did; it turns out that they only wanted a picture of the voucher cut in half, and for some unknown reason I didn't take a picture prior to posting. (With hindsight, why would they need the voucher cut in half if they were being sent it anyway?). As a result, I fully expected the voucher to conveniently "get lost in the post", but today I received an email stating that they'd sorted out my new voucher and it was in the post. About 4 months after I first emailed them!

 

[robbeech]

Northern are currently taking around 5 to 7 days to process claims and then a further full week for free tickets to arrive in the post

Northern have actually been much faster at dealing with ‘simple’ claims of late. They certainly deserve credit for that.

This isn't quit on topic, but is related to delay repay and isn't worth a new thread. Sorry!

Last summer I was delayed on a train. I applied for delay repay, and was sent a voucher. When I tried to use it, it didn't work. I emailed GWR (the issuer), and eventually they replied, basically saying "that's fine, we'll send you a replacement voucher". There was some rather dodgy wording in the emails, which suggested I needed to post them my existing voucher, cut in half, which I did; it turns out that they only wanted a picture of the voucher cut in half, and for some unknown reason I didn't take a picture prior to posting. (With hindsight, why would they need the voucher cut in half if they were being sent it anyway?). As a result, I fully expected the voucher to conveniently "get lost in the post", but today I received an email stating that they'd sorted out my new voucher and it was in the post. About 4 months after I first emailed them!

Good news then.

I’m not sure if operators have the ability to ‘cancel’ a voucher ahead of its proposed expiry date without access to the voucher itself. I know they certainly can’t with old style paper tickets. For this reason I guess it makes sense to just have a blanket procedure for this. For all they know you could have been telling fibs about the voucher, or you could have already used it, there is perhaps no efficient or reliable way to check this.

 

[Watershed]

Northern have actually been much faster at dealing with ‘simple’ claims of late. They certainly deserve credit for that.


Good news then.

I’m not sure if operators have the ability to ‘cancel’ a voucher ahead of its proposed expiry date without access to the voucher itself. I know they certainly can’t with old style paper tickets. For this reason I guess it makes sense to just have a blanket procedure for this. For all they know you could have been telling fibs about the voucher, or you could have already used it, there is perhaps no efficient or reliable way to check this.

I think there is a database of vouchers, hence why they now have to be scanned in manually.

 

[jrh2254]

The delay is calculated on the whole journey end to end compared to expected schedule. If part of the journey is delayed, sometimes time is made up later or more time lost depending on connections etc. So you do need to specify the whole journey that you made and calculate any delay based on that.

Thanks for this. I made a delay repay claim with Avanti and only put the Avanti delayed part of the journey as nowhere on the online claim form could I find how to include the multiple legs? I did manage to send a picture of all my tickets
I have now had a rejection as I did not put in the the multiple legs. I appealed and still could not enter the multiple legs so I sent them the picture of my tickets again, but it was rejected again.
They said to send them an email of all the info again so thats what I did a few weeks ago.
Hopefully 3rd time lucky!

 

[johntea]

A simple ‘no’ I suspect but a situation I had this morning and worth asking for nothing

Set off for the 09:03, showed up as ‘Delayed’ on the way there with no updates so diverted for a coffee instead!

09:03 departed 10:57
10:04 departed 10:45
10:33 departed 10:34 (I used this service)

But I only purchased my ticket from the TVM at 10:23 (and off peak at that) once I was confident the 10:33 was a winner so guessing there is absolutely no delay repay claim to be had here?

I use the TVM rather than eTickets as I purchase PlusBus on top, also an interesting point I was thinking of was should I have wanted to purchase my ticket with cash rather than card the first opportunity would have actually been on board the 10:33 service being an unstaffed station!

 

[gray1404]

A simple ‘no’ I suspect but a situation I had this morning and worth asking for nothing

Set off for the 09:03, showed up as ‘Delayed’ on the way there with no updates so diverted for a coffee instead!

09:03 departed 10:57
10:04 departed 10:45
10:33 departed 10:34 (I used this service)

But I only purchased my ticket from the TVM at 10:23 (and off peak at that) once I was confident the 10:33 was a winner so guessing there is absolutely no delay repay claim to be had here?

I use the TVM rather than eTickets as I purchase PlusBus on top, also an interesting point I was thinking of was should I have wanted to purchase my ticket with cash rather than card the first opportunity would have actually been on board the 10:33 service being an unstaffed station!

Did you originally plan to catch the 9.03 or the 10.04 or was the 1033 your intended service?

 

[johntea]

The 09:03 was what I had planned, and the 10:33 was the earliest service to turn up (had that not turned up I would have worked from home instead hence the 10:23 ticket purchase)

 

[stew]

A simple ‘no’ I suspect but a situation I had this morning and worth asking for nothing

Set off for the 09:03, showed up as ‘Delayed’ on the way there with no updates so diverted for a coffee instead!

09:03 departed 10:57
10:04 departed 10:45
10:33 departed 10:34 (I used this service)

But I only purchased my ticket from the TVM at 10:23 (and off peak at that) once I was confident the 10:33 was a winner so guessing there is absolutely no delay repay claim to be had here?

I use the TVM rather than eTickets as I purchase PlusBus on top, also an interesting point I was thinking of was should I have wanted to purchase my ticket with cash rather than card the first opportunity would have actually been on board the 10:33 service being an unstaffed station!

I’ve always wondered how the “intended service” can be quantified. Some have said you have to be at the station at the time of the intended service to show “intention” however I’ve never been able to find that requirement in any TOC’s delay repay conditions

 

[Moonpie]

I might be misunderstanding... but isn't delay repay part of the terms of the contract when you buy a ticket. Surely that kicks in when you buy the ticket. So you only made that contract with them at 10.23 ?

 

[gray1404]

In that case, as you genuinely intended to catch it, I would claim based on what the arrival time of the 9.03 should have been Vs your actual arrival time.

I have never had a problem claiming in this way when I have delayed my departure to the station when I have seen that trains are cancelled or delayed and still not purchased my ticket until I actually got to the station.

It is pointless getting to the station early just to purchase a ticket when you know you will just be sat around waiting for nothing when there are delays and cancellations.

I think this is an example where we on the forum can get a bit obsessed or side tracked with the fine detail rather than apply the common sense approach that is often applied.

 

[Watershed]

I might be misunderstanding... but isn't delay repay part of the terms of the contract when you buy a ticket. Surely that kicks in when you buy the ticket. So you only made that contract with them at 10.23 ?

Yes, in essence all operators' delay compensation schemes will exclude compensation where you were aware of the delay when you bought your ticket.

This makes for a somewhat difficult situation if you turn up to the station, see there's disruption, and therefore hold back on buying a ticket until you know that things are moving. But in the circumstances the best course of action is to buy a ticket straight away (if you haven't already bought in advance), so as to maximise your entitlement to delay compensation.

 

[robbeech]

I might be misunderstanding... but isn't delay repay part of the terms of the contract when you buy a ticket. Surely that kicks in when you buy the ticket. So you only made that contract with them at 10.23 ?

This is the argument the railway will present to you, however I think in some cases there would be a suitable counter argument to suggest that providing you were there for the intended service then the ticket purchase time shouldn’t matter, simply because you may have not had an opportunity to purchase at all.
You make a point of saying you bought an off peak ticket though, is that not valid on the 0903? This could be the sticking point.

 

[gray1404]

You make a point of saying you bought an off peak ticket though, is that not valid on the 0903? This could be the sticking point.

Good point.

I think the only thing the OP can do then is stick in a claim and see what happens. It may be approved and if not they can explain their specific circumstances at appeal stage.

 

[johntea]

Thanks, glad it wasn't just me trying and failing to understand the exact criteria!

I'll stick a claim through the Northern system and see what they come back with, I suspect there may even be a chance their automated checking may just process the claim anyway in the end! (I usually go for the freebie ticket rather than cash compensation)

 

[STINT47]

I had a claim rejected as my ticket was scanned at the barriers after the scheduled departure time.

I looked on National Rail when I finished work and it showed my train home was running 40 minutes late. Instead of standing on the platform in the rain I stayed at work for an extra 20 minutes then headed for the station.

They are correct that the time my ticket was scanned at the ticket barriers after the original scheduled departure time but that was only because I knew of the delay beforehand. Personally I would have rather got home on time instead of doing extra work.

It seems harsh to me but I can see where the TOC is coming from.

 

[Kite159]

I had a claim rejected as my ticket was scanned at the barriers after the scheduled departure time.

I looked on National Rail when I finished work and it showed my train home was running 40 minutes late. Instead of standing on the platform in the rain I stayed at work for an extra 20 minutes then headed for the station.

They are correct that the time my ticket was scanned at the ticket barriers after the original scheduled departure time but that was only because I knew of the delay beforehand. Personally I would have rather got home on time instead of doing extra work.

It seems harsh to me but I can see where the TOC is coming from.

And of course if someone arrives at a station, sees the train they intend to catch is delayed, and decides to stay on the public side of the gateline to access station facilities, rather than going through the barriers to stand/sit on the platform. Especially if the area beyond the barriers have nothing in the way of facilities.