crosscity
Member
In early July I booked return SailRail Advance journeys from Birmingham to Dublin via the TfW website. They were for a couple in my family. The outward journey was for Sun 1st September and the return for Wed 4th Sep. The outward trip was via Stena and the return via the afternoon Irish Ferries ‘Swift’ service. The journey to Dublin passed without incident. Coming back was a disaster.
On presentation at the Irish Ferries (IF) desk at Dublin Port the couple were told the 1350 Swift service had been cancelled, but was not offered an alternative placing on the next IF ferry, but advised to go to the Stena desk at the other side of the Port to get the afternoon 1450 Stena ferry. This would mean an arrival in Holyhead 2h15m later than planned, and arrival at New St at just under 3h later.
They were booked on to the Stena Ferry free of charge. Unfortunately the Stena ferry hit rough weather, and was unable to dock at Holyhead until 2140, 3h20 late, and way after the last train from Holyhead at 2032. Stena arranged a coach and hotel, and the rail journey was completed the following morning with an arrival at New St at 1050 (instead of 2029) so more than 14 hours late.
The couple are furious and are demanding compensation. They found out the IF Swift vessel had been taken out of service at least a week before (so not cancelled because of the weather), and expected IF to have contacted them, as TfW had all their details. This would have allowed them to consider cancelling, or amending the booking for the next day. They were also not offered food and drink on the delayed Stena service, and it took some effort to persuade Stena that they needed to do something with the number of rail-passengers stranded at Holyhead.
How realistic is their claim for compensation, who should pay it and what is the best way of going about claiming it?
On presentation at the Irish Ferries (IF) desk at Dublin Port the couple were told the 1350 Swift service had been cancelled, but was not offered an alternative placing on the next IF ferry, but advised to go to the Stena desk at the other side of the Port to get the afternoon 1450 Stena ferry. This would mean an arrival in Holyhead 2h15m later than planned, and arrival at New St at just under 3h later.
They were booked on to the Stena Ferry free of charge. Unfortunately the Stena ferry hit rough weather, and was unable to dock at Holyhead until 2140, 3h20 late, and way after the last train from Holyhead at 2032. Stena arranged a coach and hotel, and the rail journey was completed the following morning with an arrival at New St at 1050 (instead of 2029) so more than 14 hours late.
The couple are furious and are demanding compensation. They found out the IF Swift vessel had been taken out of service at least a week before (so not cancelled because of the weather), and expected IF to have contacted them, as TfW had all their details. This would have allowed them to consider cancelling, or amending the booking for the next day. They were also not offered food and drink on the delayed Stena service, and it took some effort to persuade Stena that they needed to do something with the number of rail-passengers stranded at Holyhead.
How realistic is their claim for compensation, who should pay it and what is the best way of going about claiming it?