What can you do if somebody sits on your booked seat ?

[Sheridan]

No reservations displayed - It seems you feel the TOC's failure should become the customer's problem?

It’s not a case of what that poster ‘feels’, rather that those are the rules as they stand. It’s not satisfactory for the reservation holder, and the lack of publicity makes it even worse, but that’s what the situation is, and the reasons for it have been explained.

 

[Mitchell Hurd]

I'm surprised at seeing the lengths that somebody or a few people on here are willing to go to to get the seat like wanting the BTP involved because the passenger won't move. Even I won't be daft enough to do that!

My First Class seat reservation only from Didcot Parkway to Bristol Temple Meads on September 10th had someone sat next to it so rather than make unnecessary fuss I sat in the forward facing window table seat next to it.

 

[LowLevel]

But as previously mentioned - I'd PAID for that reservation - the able-bodied, shifty-looking occupant of the seat had not. All very well to claim "computer says no" as justification for a freeloader's paradise -yet again.

No reservations displayed - It seems you feel the TOC's failure should become the customer's problem? Not acceptable - I regard that as total abdication of responsibility by the company, and by the train manager as their senior representative. Hence my desire to get this "all sorted" prior to departure from Euston - much to the disgust of one above commentator!

There are multiple customers involved though and while the failure is the TOCs it is equally poor for the other customer to potentially play musical chairs at every stop along the route.

That is why there is a provision to compensate you by the train operator instead.

Furthermore the railway byelaws only make reservations enforceable where the TOC has labelled the seat and there is no penalty for occupying an unmarked seat, regardless of a person holding a reservation coupon.

Your confidence in the matter of your blocking the trains departure in an attempt to force the issue and then being able to go on your way afterwards is misplaced.

I'll say the same - if I had been the train manager it would have been you left at Euston for blocking the doors. It is not up to you to regulate the departure of the train over a customer service issue.

A safety issue such as the non provision of a life vest on an aircraft is not comparable.

 

[Falcon1200]

I can't quite believe that I'm reading the sentence a 'trouble-causer who may endanger public safety' in relation to someone who won't get up for you when they didn't need to do so.

Same here!

Hence my desire to get this "all sorted" prior to departure from Euston - much to the disgust of one above commentator!

Deliberately delaying a train, and all its passengers, is a total overreaction to a trivial complaint over seat reservations, and if someone really tried that I would expect them to be removed and the train leave without them (which would at least solve the reservation issue....)

 

[Lurcheroo]

Honestly, for those who seemed to not understand why I hate seat reservations, I’m glad they’re gone, hope they don’t come back and do not think that the default answer to “my seat is taken” should be a free upgrade, then I hope the unhinged nature of some of these replies show why I have my views, whether they’re agreed with or not (and that’s totally fine too).

People can’t seem to wrap their head around the fact they don’t pay for a reservation or the fact that we (train manager/conductor) will go and try and resolve it in terms of asking a passenger to move but if they refuse (and have a valid ticket) then that’s it. We can’t do anything, the BTP are not going to come over a seat reservation, in fact I’d probably get laughed at on the phone for making the call.
Plus if a passenger has been sat in a seat for 2 hours then someone gets on with a reservation I totally see why they wouldn’t be too happy about being forced out for someone travelling 30 minutes. Especially when other seats are available, I’ve seen passengers go full crazy mode over a seat for a 15 minute journey when the arguably nicer table seat behind them is available. It is beggars belief sometimes.

But also to clarify, yes, if someone is preventing the train from leaving (only way they can do that is by obstructing the doors or pulling a pas-com then they’ve moved from an annoyance to genuine problem and safety concern so yes I will call and say some dude is causing a safety concern. In fact I may even give a full description along with my body cam number so they can be easily traced later if they decided disappear.

Same here!



Deliberately delaying a train, and all its passengers, is a total overreaction to a trivial complaint over seat reservations, and if someone really tried that I would expect them to be removed and the train leave without them (which would at least solve the reservation issue....)

Not to mention that every minute of delay is hellish expensive for a TOC. Because you’re not just paying for the delay of that service, any other service that gets delayed will also get costed to this incident. So if TOCs start getting large amount of delays attributed them due to issues with passengers over seat reservations , then guess what they’ll want to do ? Sack off seat reservations, as it’ll be the easiest solution.