Northern Claim I should get refund not delay repay - start short journey by own transport means

[hkstudent]

In January, I tried to travel on a Northern Branch Line and connect to West Coast service, using the open rerurn portion. But the branch line was closed whole day. So I got to find my own transport (long detour buses) to the mainline station to continue.

Northern unsurprisingly rejected my DR application, and suggested me to refund instead. The wordings are:

We?re sorry but we have been unable to locate a service that enabled you to complete your journey by train, you are entitled to a full refund from the ticket retailer if you didn?t travel due to cancellations or delays or you abandoned the journey and returned to the station of origin. No administration fees should be applied in these circumstances.

If you completed your journey using replacement transport that Northern have provided, then please appeal this claim rejection via your delay repay account and let us know.

If you had to arrange your own transport and completed some of the journey by train and did not return to the station of origin then you are entitled to a refund of your ticket and depending on the reason for disruption any additional costs you may have occurred to complete your journey, so please ensure you keep any receipts.

That's seems not right if the journey was travelled already and have caused delay already, especially given that the Northern branch is not more than 5% of my journey mileage.

Delay is more than 120mins due to infrequency of bus services and far from the origin station itself.

 

[30907]

I think Northern are wrong here, assuming you completed the rest of your journey.

I don't think you need to be secretive about the Northern station, though

 

[hkstudent]

Northern still consistently rejecting my claim despite I have said that I got an alternative transport to a Avanti mainline station to continue the remaining 95% of the mileage.

What do you think I should think? Avanti didn't clip my ticket as no ticket checks and no barriers were passed at Glasgow Central.

 

[RAPC]

Was the branch line closed with no timetabled services that day, or were they cancelled on the day?

If it was the former, then they will continue to reject this as the timetable of the day had no services, so you couldn't have been delayed by a Northern service. Whether this is reasonable is another matter. If it was the latter and all timetabled services were cancelled on the day, then I think they would normally process it on appeal.

 

[hkstudent]

Was the branch line closed with no timetabled services that day, or were they cancelled on the day?

If it was the former, then they will continue to reject this as the timetable of the day had no services, so you couldn't have been delayed by a Northern service. Whether this is reasonable is another matter. If it was the latter and all timetabled services were cancelled on the day, then I think they would normally process it on appeal.

It was a tree fall after the storm. They said prior to my appeal that if I took a Northern arranged alternative transport, delay repay is due. But if take alternative transport to the mainline station to continue the journey, I should refund it despite I have taken the service.

 

[RAPC]

It was a tree fall after the storm. They said prior to my appeal that if I took a Northern arranged alternative transport, delay repay is due. But if take alternative transport to the mainline station to continue the journey, I should refund it despite I have taken the service.

Did Northern provide alternative transport? If they did, is there any reason why you didn't take it?

That is their normal policy, so they are being consistent. Basically their view is that if their transport delays you, delay repay is payable. However if you choose to make your own way there, you have actively chosen not to travel with Northern, which in turn normally means getting a refund as part of your ticket can be refunded.

You mentioned that you didn't have your return ticket checked or have it go through a barrier. If you follow Northern's recommendation, you could just apply to have that return portion refunded. You are sticking to their guidance and save yourself the pain of continued correspondence and likely refusal for delay repay compensation.

 

[CompactDstrxion]

Did you actually visit the branch line station on that day to start your journey from there, or did you make your own way directly to the main line station?

 

[scrapy]

It would help if you could give some timings and details of the journey you should have made verses the journey actually taken, and your actual arrival time at your destination and details of the timings of replacement transport

Was the branch line closed on the day or had the train been cancelled before 10pm the previous evening?

 

[Watershed]

Was the branch line closed on the day or had the train been cancelled before 10pm the previous evening?

This certainlty doesn't have any impact on the OP's eligibility for a refund and it is highly questionable whether it is legitimate for Delay Repay claims to be reduced (let alone denied entirely, if all trains are cancelled) on that basis.