Virgin Trains First Class lounges and short distance journeys

[sn1975]

Hi,

Is it just me or do Virgin Trains prefer first class passengers travelling short distances not to use the first class lounges?

The reason I ask is that I love travelling first class with Virgin but can only afford to take short journeys and not as often as I would like.

We had a really nice trip from Atherstone to Wolverhampton last Friday, travelling with Virgin from Birmingham New Street to Wolverhampton and back and the highlight of the day was travelling with Virgin and making use of the first class privileges and we visited the lounges briefly at New Street and Wolverhampton, for no more than about 20 minutes in each.

We didn't have any problems at the staffed lounge at New Street but at Wolverhampton the member of staff operating the access camera seemed reluctant to allow us to use the lounge.

I've used both the Birmingham and Wolverhampton lounges a few times, constantly aware that they are a privilege, not a right and always treat them with respect and follow the "rules" and tidy up after myself - in fact on Friday at Wolverhampton I was tidying up after other people

Just wondering if anyone has any thoughts?

Many thanks.

 

[wintonian]

Of course Virgin would rather you paid £258 for Euston to Wolves return rather than the £7.40 I assume you paid for this shorter trip.

However its up to virgin if they want to introduce rules of elitism like a minimum fare you need to pay in order to access the lounges. As they currently don't you are perfectly entitled to take advantage of them and IMO is doesn't matter if you paid £7.40 or £258 you still shouldn't stay for longer than is reasonable.