Northern Delay Repay Problem

[gray1404]

Had delayed service from York to Preston and missed connection for Ormskirk. I was travelling with 2 young adults form a commnity group I help run who are disabled. I filled out an online complaint form for Northern in which I stated the details of the delay (intended trains, actual trains taken). I explained that I was claiming for myself and 2 adults who were travelling with me who are disabled and as such are unable to claim for themselves. I requested compensation in the form of Northern tickets to be used for a future free journey. I also took a photo of the tickets and attached this to the online complaint form.

The email reply I have received from Northern is less then ideal. It says: -

"Please can you forward your tickets either by email or post within 28 days to the below address, so that we can process any delay repay compensation that is due to you. However, please be aware that if you provide us with evidence electronically (either via email or through the Northern website) you will have to cut the tickets in half before taking the picture."

The problem I have with this is that I have already sent them copies of the tickets and secondly, no where on their website does it say that I needed to cut the tickets in half, or I would have done this. As a side point, I cannot find the tickets now. I know they are at home somewhere and I will defiantly find them.

Are Northern allowed to impose a 28 day time limit for me to provide the tickets again, bearing in mind I have already adhered to the 28 day time it for submitted the initial claim.

The email then says: -

"With regards to acting on behalf of your fellow passengers I would be happy to accept their tickets if you could be kind enough to include them. However, all claims are validated against our train running information records. Please provide details of their address or telephone number and I would be more than happy to contact them on your behalf. The Data Protection Act 1998 states that sensitive personal data who has physical or mental health or condition are protected."

I take a number of issues with this. First, I do not see why they have thrown in the sentence about validating claims against train running records because that is not relevant to acting on behalf of disabled people I was travelling with. There is no way I am going to provide any telephone numbers of the other passengers. Both of them would be unable to handle such a call and find it very confusing. They would even get confused by receiving a letter from Northern.

Have Northern messed up here or am I best complying with what they want? i.e. find the tickets, cut them in half and send then in again along with the addresses of the other 2 passengers? There is a side of me that thinks they already have all the required information and copies of tickets.

 

[AlterEgo]

Something has obviously gone awry, and I recommend picking up the phone to find out where the misunderstanding lies. Then come back to us.

 

[najaB]

Have Northern messed up here or am I best complying with what they want? i.e. find the tickets, cut them in half and send then in again along with the addresses of the other 2 passengers? There is a side of me that thinks they already have all the required information and copies of tickets.

Were the tickets defaced and would that have been clear in the copies you sent previously? It is normally a condition of Delay Repay schemes that the tickets be rendered incapable of reuse/refund.

 

[gray1404]

The tickets were "day" tickets so had no further validity after the day of travel. They were not marked by staff on the day in any way. Perhaps the scan of 3 tickets all in one photo would not have been as clear as they would have liked - just a guess.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Were the tickets defaced and would that have been clear in the copies you sent previously? It is normally a condition of Delay Repay schemes that the tickets be rendered incapable of reuse/refund.

It's not. ScotRail do this, but this is the first time I have heard of another TOC doing it.

 

[najaB]

It's not. ScotRail do this, but this is the first time I have heard of another TOC doing it.

I'm pretty sure that one of the Virgin TOCs (or it might have been East Coast) used to require it as well. Not the cut in half, but that they had to be defaced. I remember it because I had a ticket that hadn't been marked and had to mark it myself (but can't remember the journey).

 

[AlterEgo]

It's not. ScotRail do this, but this is the first time I have heard of another TOC doing it.

XC also used to publish this requirement but never insisted on it.

Would still recommend the OP phone Northern as there must be a reason they've asked for this...

 

[Bletchleyite]

I'm pretty sure that one of the Virgin TOCs (or it might have been East Coast) used to require it as well. Not the cut in half, but that they had to be defaced. I remember it because I had a ticket that hadn't been marked and had to mark it myself (but can't remember the journey).

VTWC definitely do not and did not (they have been the cause of most of my claims!) - nor TPE.

 

[AlterEgo]

I don't see what's so difficult about picking up the phone. I certainly would if I'd received a confusing response like that.

 

[gray1404]

What line of approach would I be best taking on the phone?

 

[AlterEgo]

What line of approach would I be best taking on the phone?

"Hi, I've made a claim but I'm not sure why you're asking me to send tickets. I sent copies them all to you in the original email, for all passengers. Can you check you have them please?"

Then take it from there.

In future, give as LITTLE info on the original claim as possible. They don't need to know you were accompanying disabled people, and I suspect this snippet of info has made a dull mind at Carillion suddenly start spewing irrelevant nonsense about the DPA.

 

[gray1404]

Thanks, I appreciate your advise, really I do. Thanks!

Your right, I've said too much. I thought they might get funny about sending 2 other passengers delay repay to myself.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---
I phoned up Northern today. It was a total waste of time. It really was not as simple as picking up the phone and shorting it out. I waited 35 minutes before I spoke to anyone. Then I was put on hold for another 5 minutes while he found my case and also checked the "separate delay repay system."

The person I spoke to had a low level of English and did not understand all the points I was trying to make.

He told me that they had not received the tickets, even though he could see on the automated e mail the system generated to confirm receipt of my form that I had attached them. He said: "I think it is not your fault sir that we have not received the tickets but it is also not our fault because we have had an IT problem at our end." He said that I would need to re-send the tickets to them by email and attach them.

When addressing the matter of my acting in behalf of other passengers who are disabled. He started out by saying: "The email we have sent you confirms that we would be happy to accept the tickets from you and reply to yourself directly for all passengers." I then asked when the names and addresses/phone numbers of the other two customers. He then put me on hold while he re-read the email. He then came back to say: "We will need to reply directly to all passengers. My colleague was just trying to balance the email out a bit, but she is not in today. Sir, so I can log your call when will you be able to send a copy of the tickets by so I can have the lady who is dealing with your case check the system on that day."

I explained that I would be able to do this on Monday and I went on to express my concern that the 2 disabled persons would not be able to handle a phone call or understand written correspondence and that I didn't feel this had been taken into account. The latter comment about the disabled people fell on somebody with no understanding of the matter whatsoever. He replied by saying: "Sir, you give us a call back on Monday then to tell us you have sent the tickets over." Then he started to tell me how they had a backlog and wanted to confirm my journey details but at that point after 45 minutes on the phone the line disconnected.

Northern do have my phone number but they didn't call me back. I do believe that is an issue at my end that calls are disconnecting after 45 minutes. So it was a total waste of time phoning. I feel that I spoke to someone who had no understanding of basic life skills, let alone knew anything about acting on behalf of a train company.

I think the best thing for me to do here is simply reply to their email with copies of the tickets again. I can see this could be a battle and therefore I am sat here now wondering if I should take this to Transport Focus. I say that in the hope that they will raise it with Senior Management in Northern who will simply pay out the delay repay (free travel vouchers).

 

[najaB]

I can see this could be a battle and therefore I am sat here now wondering if I should take this to Transport Focus. I say that in the hope that they will raise it with Senior Management in Northern who will simply pay out the delay repay (free travel vouchers).

I can't see any grounds for taking this to Transport Focus - this is still with front line customer services and may well be resolved with an email on Monday.

 

[AlterEgo]

It sounds from the phone call that Carillion are under instructions to issue delay repay to each and every party, which sounds like a total cluster frick if you ask me. More inconvenience for everyone involved. This seems a little unlikely though as it's just so stupid from a business perspective, sending replies out in duplicate or triplicate and all the extra buggering around involved in securing all the details.

Another possibility is that there is a note on your Northern CRM contact record which means they scrutinise your claim differently. That does not imply any wrongdoing on your part, but this can happen for a whole smorgasbord of reasons, many of which are completely benign. A totally inexhaustive list of reasons could be:

- Repeated Transport Focus escalations
- Suspected fraud
- Serial or vexatious complainant
- Unusual journeys
- Previous BTP or Revenue encounters
- "In The Know" customer
- Difficult or abusive caller
- Special requirements (Braille/accessible/Welsh responses etc)
- VIP

Just off the top of my head.

I find it difficult to believe Carillion would treat every single claim in the manner they seem to be doing with yours.

If you're curious about the above you can find out by doing a Subject Access Request...

 

[gray1404]

I think that this might be a combination of maybe they have not received the tickets and also it threw them my mentioning acting for 2 disabled people also. I too thought it would be a straight forward request in which they reply with the free travel vouchers.

- Repeated Transport Focus escalations
Never took a Northern case to TF before
- Suspected fraud
- Serial or vexatious complainant
Only had 2 delay replay claims since New Northern and these were paid out fast. (Under old Northen I had 2 delay claims and 2 ticket refund requests)
- Unusual journeys
Possibly, I do tend to travel with Northern on rover/ranger tickets and do make unusual journeys covering large sections on their network (although in this case it was a simply York to Ormskirk - changing at Preston)
- Previous BTP or Revenue encounters
Thankfully not, on both counts
- "In The Know" customer
- Difficult or abusive caller
Never had any difficult dealings with them. In fact all the calls have been pleasent and friendly in tone - even if the content of what is being said is nonsance.
- Special requirements (Braille/accessible/Welsh responses etc)
- VIP

 

[sheff1]

I phoned up Northern today. It was a total waste of time.
<snip>

Does not surprise me. This is more and more the way second rate companies like to deal with things nowadays. They make it next to impossible to actually get though to someone who could sort out the issue in no time at all, instead you are forced to deal with people who struggle (or completely fail) to understand what you are telling them and merely regurgitate irrelevant stock 'answers' from scripts.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

Another possibility is that there is a note on your Northern CRM contact record which means they scrutinise your claim differently. That does not imply any wrongdoing on your part, but this can happen for a whole smorgasbord of reasons, many of which are completely benign.A totally inexhaustive list of reasons could be:

- Repeated Transport Focus escalations
- Suspected fraud
- Serial or vexatious complainant
- Unusual journeys
- Previous BTP or Revenue encounters
- "In The Know" customer
- Difficult or abusive caller
- Special requirements (Braille/accessible/Welsh responses etc)
- VIP

I am rather intrigued by this list. I would expect that if someone did fall into such categories they would be dealt with by someone who did understand English fully and could close the matter with the minimum of fuss.

 

[gray1404]

So to update, Monday afternoon I replied to the email I received from Northern and attached the same image again of the tickets. That evening I phoned up, waited 20 seconds to speak to someone. Very polite man but told me that the complaints team who deal with delay repay are only there until 5pm and there is only a manager on duty until 7pm. He said they are only there overnight to provide general information and could I please call back at 9am.

I called back Tuesday at 8.55am and waited 5 minutes to speak to someone. The lady was helpful and I explained that I had emailed the tickets over. She said she would email the lady dealing with my case and I would hear back soon. An hour later I received a phone call from the lady dealing with my case. She was very friendly and we had a lovely chat about the places you could go to on the Northern network with the free travel passes she would be sending me that day (covering both myself and other passengers).

I received the said complimentary day passes the next day on Wednesday, along with a network map and friendly cover letter.