Delay repay: I love it when my train is 35 minutes late...

[OLJR]

I was on an East Coast service the other week and was very pleased that it was delayed for 35 minutes as I got my 50% delay repay voucher today!

Of course a three hour delay is another matter, but I always build plenty of spare time into my schedule so if all of my longhaul trains were 35 minutes late I would be very happy!

 

[thenorthern]

I like it if they are going to delay a train that its at least 31 min delayed.

I think I have about £40 in delay repay vouchers stacked up somewhere because of the amount of times I have been delayed.

 

[GatwickDepress]

I must be unlucky. The only time my trains are considerably late are when I'm on dirt-cheap advances!

 

[sadgit]

I ended up on an Abellio Greater Anglia service the other day that ticked over to 60 minutes late (well, 60 minutes delay to my arrival...) just as it pulled into Norwich, literally halfway down the platform. I was a very happy bunny...

 

[bb21]

I am not sure you will still be saying that if it happened every other time you travelled.

A few years ago, I went through a period of every other journey made being delayed by at least 30 minutes. It lasted for about three weeks and by the end of the second week I was praying that I would never suffer a delay again. Needless to say it didn't work.

At one stage I had about £700 of delay vouchers stacked up. Looking back, I would rather not have these vouchers in exchange for several days of my life back.

 

[asylumxl]

I hate when my trains delayed 35 minutes, as Thameslink tries to claim it wasn't and rejects my claim.

Give them their due, when I replied questioning their decision they took the time to write to me to apologise for the "clerical error".

 

[orpine]

I am not sure you will still be saying that if it happened every other time you travelled.

I dunno. I was doing a regular weekly trip on an XC and the outward portion was pretty much always late by about 30 mins. A have a nice stack of vouches to use now. Of course, it still irked me that there were no announcements or signs anywhere advising people of their eligibility.

The downside of course is that I can't actually use the vouchers now; I'm miles from a train station and I generally only buy advances which means online....

 

[Starmill]

Unless you're making a profit, having the green vouchers is nice, but in perspective it's probably better to have the journey go to plan.

Having said that, whether I book First Class is generally influenced by how likely I think it that my journey will be delayed, mainly because it will be more comfortable, or rather will avoid being really uncomfortable for longer, but also because you get more back.

 

[sadgit]

I am not sure you will still be saying that if it happened every other time you travelled.

A few years ago, I went through a period of every other journey made being delayed by at least 30 minutes. It lasted for about three weeks and by the end of the second week I was praying that I would never suffer a delay again. Needless to say it didn't work.

At one stage I had about £700 of delay vouchers stacked up. Looking back, I would rather not have these vouchers in exchange for several days of my life back.

Don't get me wrong, I would rather have my journey go to plan (it being Christmas soon, I would hope Abellio would be nice and let that happen for a change; my journeys go absolutely perfectly on the South West Trains leg, to be followed immediately after by the "here be dragons" stage of dealing with AGA who seem thoroughly incapable of running a train on time, to the point where it literally does happen every other time I travel). However getting the whole cost of the journey back after being delayed for an hour is far preferable to being delayed 40/50 minutes and getting half back, or worse 25 minutes and getting sod all. I would much rather have an extra £15 back in my pocket than an extra 10 minutes of my life.

Frankly Delay Repay is very generous in many respects; the other option for me would be National Express, who are unreasonably late a lot of the time to an extent that they make Abellio look like paragons of timekeeping and will give you sod all in the way of recompense for it, while not really being all that much cheaper. That said, I would much rather DR compo was paid as cheques and not vouchers, which frankly are a pain in the 'arris as you can't use them anywhere except stations and the last time I tried buying tickets in SOU's ticket office I wasn't best impressed...

Having said that, whether I book First Class is generally influenced by how likely I think it that my journey will be delayed, mainly because it will be more comfortable, or rather will avoid being really uncomfortable for longer, but also because you get more back.

Given the piddly price differential between a 1st Advance and a standard Advance on AGA I can't think of many reasons one wouldn't want to go first class on the usual journey I make...

 

[DelayRepay]

Frankly Delay Repay is very generous in many respects

I try my best

I do wish the TOCs would find a way to offer e-vouchers as compensation, so they can be used online. This would be in their interests too as they'd save printing/postage costs. I think there was talk about it at one point but for now we're still stuck with paper

 

[sadgit]

I try my best

I do wish the TOCs would find a way to offer e-vouchers as compensation, so they can be used online. This would be in their interests too as they'd save printing/postage costs. I think there was talk about it at one point but for now we're still stuck with paper

Mumble mumble, conspiracy to put people off claiming by giving them vouchers that are hard to spend, mumble mumble...

 

[Starmill]

I try my best

I do wish the TOCs would find a way to offer e-vouchers as compensation, so they can be used online. This would be in their interests too as they'd save printing/postage costs....

Or maybe not, because then people might actually use them! :P Although I think Southern does this.

 

[DelayRepay]

I use my vouchers but the station staff must get annoyed when I pay for an £80 season ticket using a pile of £5 - £10 vouchers.

 

[Starmill]

Probably not as annoyed as when you board at an unstaffed station and the guard won't take them as payment...

 

[causton]

At a ticket office is fine with the barcodes. Now they just get scanned and sent off! Before they had to be manually typed in, photocopied, numbers written down on the cash up sheets, add up the total to include in your takings so the money balances...

Which reminds me, I have one to spend!

 

[ASharpe]

I've had quite a few 30-59 minute delays recently, but on trains that don't do half hour delay repay. Too much Grand Central, Northern and SWT travel.

Now I'm buying Advances speculatively I don't think I'll be expecting any decent payouts soon. Hardly any point asking Grand Central for £1.50.

I still do a fair bit of travel on East Cost but unfortunately if delayed past the last bus form Leeds a taxi would cost more than I'd likely get back.

I'd love to see a system where you could trade delayed minutes for extra travel minutes (even if restricted to same TOC and off-peak) with no minimum. Probably would be a administrative nightmare for all involved unless smart cards got very smart.

 

[Howardh]

Jus wonder, on the other hand, how many of us have turned up at the station with many minutes to spare, and a late train rolls in and we get to our destination earlier than anticipated?!

 

[stut]

Jus wonder, on the other hand, how many of us have turned up at the station with many minutes to spare, and a late train rolls in and we get to our destination earlier than anticipated?!

Happened to me as recently as last night - it was one of the few non-stops too!

As far as delays go, the best ones are on connections when you were planning on a long connection anyway.

For example, 5 minutes late into Peterborough on a Sunday could cost you your GN connection and delay you for an hour. But if you were planning on popping over to Queensgate to pick up some groceries and a coffee anyway...

 

[ASharpe]

Jus wonder, on the other hand, how many of us have turned up at the station with many minutes to spare, and a late train rolls in and we get to our destination earlier than anticipated?!

Even better when it comes with announcement that it will be running fast and missing stops to get to it's (and your) destination quicker.

 

[Howardh]

It's like when I was meeting a friend in a pub "Sorry I'm early, the train was late".

 

[Tetchytyke]

I'd much rather be on time and do without the £3.95 Delay Repay voucher for a 30 minute delay. £8 an hour isn't even the London Minimum Wage, it's certainly nowhere near my hourly rate.

But even more frustrating than a 35 minute delay is a 25 minute delay.

 

[GadgetMan]

As far as delays go, the best ones are on connections when you were planning on a long connection anyway.

For example, 5 minutes late into Peterborough on a Sunday could cost you your GN connection and delay you for an hour. But if you were planning on popping over to Queensgate to pick up some groceries and a coffee anyway...

.......then YOUR journey hasn't really been delayed by an hour as you still get to your destination on time.:roll:

 

[ASharpe]

I could be rather easy to game the system. For example instead of Buying a Guildford to Bradford return buy a Chilworth to Bradford.

It doesn't cost any more money and could easily take some delays from just a few minutes up to 2 hours.

However if you didn't actually want to travel to chilworth then your journey would not actually be delayed that much.

 

[orpine]

.......then YOUR journey hasn't really been delayed by an hour as you still get to your destination on time.:roll:

But to counter that, what happens if you miss a connection (5-29mins) to another form of public transport (i.e. an hourly or even 2hourly bus?). Your journey is delayed but unless I'm mistaken, Delay Repay won't be paying out unless it's a "rail" connection of some kind.

Swings and roundabouts.

 

[GadgetMan]

But to counter that, what happens if you miss a connection (5-29mins) to another form of public transport (i.e. an hourly or even 2hourly bus?). Your journey is delayed but unless I'm mistaken, Delay Repay won't be paying out unless it's a "rail" connection of some kind.

Swings and roundabouts.

The railway doesn't claim to guarantee connections to other modes of transport. Missing a bus etc is inconvenient but that's a risk you accept when traveling by train+bus/boat/plane etc.

If you can't see what I highlighted as being dishonest then that's up to you. I just see it as a significant number of people in this country being morally bankrupt.

 

[Cletus]

I've had a few 29 and 59 minute delays. That does make me suspicious!

 

[SuperOwl86]

How long do East Coast normally take to due delay repay?

Waiting for a 64min delay from 10th November.

 

[Deerfold]

I'd much rather be on time and do without the £3.95 Delay Repay voucher for a 30 minute delay. £8 an hour isn't even the London Minimum Wage, it's certainly nowhere near my hourly rate.

I'm guessing you mean the London Living wage? The Minimum wage is no different in London and is £6.50.

But even more frustrating than a 35 minute delay is a 25 minute delay.

Deinitely. I had a run of these with East Coast - I'd rather be just over 30 minutes than just under, but I'd even more rather be on time.

When I was 80 minutes late from Penrith to London in February I was very glad I'd paid the extra for First Class.

 

[Bishopstone]

I'm claiming an average of three times a week at present on my Down train, in the 30-59 minute range.

And I work from home one day a week....

I would rather have my evenings back, but the vouchers pay for some nice First Class Inter City treats.

And I agree: a 29 minute delay is extremely frustrating. It is quite gratifying, in these 'close calls', when someone needs the ramp at Newhaven Town.

 

[Merseysider]

I travel primarily with Northern and they only do delay repay for 60+ mins; if it was 30 I'd be quids in. But several times, I've suffered 2-3 hours of separate delays with NT over the course of a week and when I've asked why performance has been so low, they've simply replied with a free day voucher.

I normally allow at least an hour leeway for anything important (uni, meetings etc) so would quite happily be delayed by 60 mins if it meant I got my money back.

On a separate note, I've just got a £20 RTV from ATW for a one hour delay, even though my ticket cost £15. They threw the extra in as 'goodwill'.