Delay Repay Rejection

[Coolzac]

Hello everyone,

Amusing anecdote here which I am sure will be resolved, but I thought I would share it to see if anyone else has had something similar.

We had a journey delayed on Sunday 8th October London Victoria to Durrington travelling on two returns with our two together railcard. Our journey was delayed by nearly 3 hours as 5 trains in a row were cancelled that we wished to travel on to get home.

I submitted a delay repay claim for the two tickets. Despite both claims having identical details (I have double checked this), I have just heard back saying that one has been approved and one has been declined! The reason for the declined one was that they did not have a train timed to depart at that time!

How can this happen? Did the claims go to parallel universes?

 

[Clip]

Write back to them explaining just that and tell them that you expect both claims to be repaid

 

[mallard]

It's a common thing for companies (not just in the rail industry) to "low-ball" customer refunds/compensation in the hopes that they'll be happy they got something and give up claiming their full entitlement.

I'm not saying that's definitely what's happening here, but it certainly wouldn't surprise me.

 

[Haywain]

Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.

 

[Harpers Tate]

I had one with Thameslink once, where one of our two claims was paid and the other rejected as a duplicate. Same time, same train, same delay, TWO different ticket images and hence serial numbers provided; TWO different prices paid (one with a Railcard discount; the other not). But still the rejection dept. picked up on us both using the same Email address, and that was good enough for them.

 

[sheff1]

I get the strong impression that attention to detail is not a requirement associated with the handling of delay claims. Some of the communications I have received suggest that the ability to understand written English is not a requirement either.

 

[yorkie]

I know several people who have had poor experiences with delay repay compensation. Some train companies do appear to be trying it on.

I had to waste a lot of time with Southeastern recently, but I eventually got more than I was due.

Best experience recently was GWR; though it was late in coming they paid more than I was due without quibble and with no fuss whatsoever.

Virgin Trains East Coast are being appalling though (and that's definitely not stupidity; malice is probably not far off!)

 

[gimmea50anyday]

If you say something nice about the train manager on duty looking after you, you often get a little extra thrown in aswell as the train manager getting a nod recognition they often deserve but gets overlooked XD

 

[Starmill]

I recently wrote a letter that was not titled or stated as a complaint (and not wirtten on a delay repay form, the delay was not long enough to be covered) expressing my thanks to the first class hosts on a train for their attempts to prevent anti-social behavior disturbing others. Sadly those causing the anti-social behavior onboard continued to do so until their intended stop, so it wasn't very effective but the hosts were tactful and made an effort. The train company thanked me for my feedback and offered me a full refund in light of my 'unpleasant' journey, even though the company hadn't done anything wrong at all.

Sadly this is the exception rather than the rule but I was very pleased.

 

[cactustwirly]

Best experience recently was GWR; though it was late in coming they paid more than I was due without quibble and with no fuss whatsoever.

Virgin Trains East Coast are being appalling though (and that's definitely not stupidity; malice is probably not far off!)

GWR was a bit mixed for me on 2 claims.
After 3 months I hadn't heard anything, so I rang them up, apparently they lost my claims.
Anyway I'm getting compensated for more than I paid for the tickets, plus an extra £10 (for each claim) as a goodwill gesture for the delay in processing my compensation.

 

[Hadders]

GWR had an issue whereby claims submitted from certain email domains were rejected as spam, even though there was an email acknowledgement...

 

[185143]

If you say something nice about the train manager on duty looking after you, you often get a little extra thrown in aswell as the train manager getting a nod recognition they often deserve but gets overlooked XD

YES.

I usually say something nice-unless I absolutely cannot be nice about anything at all. 9 times out of 10 you get something extra for the effort!

Regarding FGW, I once complained as I spent an hour of a West Mids Day Ranger in Worcester festering for a Hereford HST for them to cancel it as it arrived. I was given a full refund of my WMDR-not bad given I'd *never* travelled with FGW prior to that claim! I think my comments were something along the lines of the TM was very apologetic about it-but it was a very poor first impression.

I was also really nice about ATW's crews on the Central Wales line back in 2015 when a train was cancelled and I lost out on scoring 3 shacks-a week before my 16th birthday (I said that too) and recieved considerably more than I was entitled to!

 

[paddington]

I've claimed lots from GWR lately.

They are consistently taking 2-3 months to respond, and always send a cheque despite me asking for RTVs.

They seem to be paying the full amounts of the tickets purchased even where this is not really the appropriate amount of compensation. For example, I was refunded the *entire* cost of a FOSW 8 in 15 rover when a train 5 minutes late caused me to miss a connecting train - and they also round everything up to the next £10

 

[gimmea50anyday]

You put in compo for a 5 min delay and they paid up???

Wow..... XD

 

[Hadders]

If a 5 minute delay caused you to miss a connection into an hourly train to your destination then you would be quite entitled to make a claim as the overall delay to your journey would be an hour.

 

[PeterC]

I had one with Thameslink once, where one of our two claims was paid and the other rejected as a duplicate. Same time, same train, same delay, TWO different ticket images and hence serial numbers provided; TWO different prices paid (one with a Railcard discount; the other not). But still the rejection dept. picked up on us both using the same Email address, and that was good enough for them.

It is pretty standard for web based systems to use email address as a unique identifier. Usually it is just an annoying demand that you log in to an account created two years ago when you last bought something from that site.

 

[DJ_K666]

Virgin Trains East Coast are being appalling though (and that's definitely not stupidity; malice is probably not far off!)

Well, given that near enough half of Virgin Trains is Stagecoach I'm really not surprised by this statement.

 

[Darandio]

Well, given that near enough half of Virgin Trains is Stagecoach I'm really not surprised by this statement.

Given you are quoting a statement about the East Coast side of things, it's 90% Stagecoach.

 

[DJ_K666]

Given you are quoting a statement about the East Coast side of things, it's 90% Stagecoach.

Is it really? Didn't know that, although that explains the poor treatment of pretty much everyone.

 

[RichE]

And, on three or four occasions at least VTEC have rejected delay repay claims saying the service ran on time. Unfortunately I don't always keep copies of my travel times when I claim a delay so I was unable to educate them.

Got one this morning so I've kept a copy, let's see what they say in a couple of weeks time.

 

[Iggy12a]

Having submitted an online delay repay to Southern with a reason of "Cancellation" and had it rejected because they say no such train exists, I then resubmitted using the "Resubmission" reason code. It too was rejected saying no such train exists. I then phone call customer services and am told that I should resubmit using the "Other" reason code. The implication was that if you use Other it has a better chance of being assessed by a human being with a modicum of intelligence. I would suggest for any future claims that we should all use Other, and forget about the Cancel/Delay/Missed Connection reason codes.

 

[bb21]

I would suggest for any future claims that we should all use Other, and forget about the Cancel/Delay/Missed Connection reason codes.

That way you just increase response times for everyone.

Most claims would be suitably captured by one of the other reasons.

 

[Iggy12a]

That way you just increase response times for everyone.

Most claims would be suitably captured by one of the other reasons.

But they are not. I would say at least 50% of my claims are rejected and then accepted following a resubmission.

 

[Llanigraham]

But you are just one person, and you cannot presume that every other person has the same response.
Doing what you suggest would likely delay many more cases.