InterCity:125
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It gets put in the lost property because the staff don’t know they weren’t travelling.
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A bag left on a train - it costs £24 to get it back
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InterCity:125
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I presume the customer would still have to pay.
InterCity:125
Member
Aren’t they running lost property for the station not just the services?
I suppose the passenger could admit to not having purchased a ticket and sue for the return of his/her property, at which point the train company could prosecute him/her for failing to buy a ticket.
InterCity:125
Member
We didn’t say they had entered through the barriers
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Indeed, and that’s the point I was making. Say I turn up to Paddington in order to meet an elderly relative off of the train: I meet them not from the “other side” of the barriers and in doing so I leave my brolly behind. I’ve not bought anything and, therefore, never agreed to the NRCOT. If I go back the next day and the lost property office charge me a fiver or whatever to give it back me they are surely, arguably, guilty of theft. Aren’t they?
InterCity:125
Member
Arguably, but it would be a hard argument to make in court considering all the left luggage announcements.
I find the lack of any customer care.in many of the above responses striking. If one left a bag in a supermarket and they tried to charge for returning it, one can imagine the fuss. Yes, I recoghise the greater volume of left luggage on trains, but to just take the attitude 'tough' and assume a £29 charge is reasonable both lacks customer care and lacks the scrutiny that most posters would bring if it was a ticket price under discussion.
If you leave your wallet or purse in some supermarkets they may not charge you to return it but the contents will be destroyed - https://www.scotsman.com/news/a-wom...p-all-her-bank-and-membership-cards-1-4772097
"A woman who left her purse in an Aldi store was reunited with it on the same day, but found her cards cut up due to “data protection”.
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She said staff at the Aldi branch in Poole cited new data protection laws and that the company destroys all cards that are not reclaimed within an hour of being lost."
To be frank that's just a case of Aldi being thick and quoting 'data protection' when they probsbly don't have a clue what the legislation says-and the story says that even Aldii itself says staff should have waited till the end of the dsy. I' ve had lost cards returned to me in stores, on production of suitable ID. If the staff were thst concerned and not wanting to retutn thrm to a customer, they should have sent them to thr bank or the police.
No, why should they keep custody of your lost junk for free?
londonbridge
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Contrast that with when I was on a coach holiday in Germany and left my jacket in the hotel room. Phoned the hotel when I got home (this was back before everyone had mobiles) and they asked me to call back after an hour or so whilst they checked for it. Phoned back, they confirmed they'd found it and asked for my address. I offered to pay postal charges but they wouldn't hear of it and sent it out to me for free.
The same reasons that shops and anyone else would-public duty and a desire to look after your customers?
Sure if it’s the odd thing like a wallet or a bag now and then. That isn’t the case for the railway or transport providers. They have to outsource or employ specific staff and it’s fair to cover the cost of that.
Good customer service?
A while back I left an umbrella on a train; realised the moment I got off. I asked at the ticket office, they called through to the next station 15 miles up the line. The umbrella was rescued and sent back on the next train for me to collect from the ticket office the next day. All for no charge.
Sure they could have responded with 'not my job' but I am grateful they didn't.
An alternative argument is that it is part of the fare. And to counter the arguments of "I don't leave things on the train, I shouldn't pay for it", there are many things I don't use but are covered as part of the train fare - For example the information desks at the stations ought to be pay per use - Does £5 a question seem reasonable?
Paying reasonable storage expenses is one thing. Paying a fee that doesn’t necessarily reflect their expenses to a profit-making company is another thing. If it goes to the left-luggage company that run the service at several large termini that is what happens. I can’t recall what the fee is off the top of my head but it applies even if the property has literally just been booked in and they have held it for 5 minutes. They make a profit from it.
I expect Heathrow made a profit from my iPad as well but I’m not in a position to tell them what “at cost” would be.
It is entirely reasonable that the cost of maintaining, staffing, and running a lost property service should be borne by those who make use of it. If it were not, the cost would fall on users of the wider facility generally, which is hardly fair.
Journeyman
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I can't say I blame them for doing it, though.
I left a (cheap) laptop at New Street a while back and it turned up in Euston. £10 to get it back (plus two short-notice advance fares to London!). Made a day of it, paid £50 for 1st and went to the Odeon Leicester Square and The Bree Louise etc etc.
10 quid was great for I say.
Especially in this era of contactless cards and online spending I can understand them being destroyed - if you lose them you should have them blocked by the bank anyway.
The best I managed to achieve once was a bloke in the motor trade leaving his car trade plates in the waiting shelter at an unmanned station. I had a brain wave and rang the crossing keeper in the adjacent crossing box who was happy to go and collect them and keep them in the box till he managed to get back for them.
Naturally as is the way of things the box is now abandoned and adorned with dead flower boxes and the all round old style bus shelter has been replaced with one with no sides that gives no weather protection.
The best I managed to achieve once was a bloke in the motor trade leaving his car trade plates in the waiting shelter at an unmanned station. I had a brain wave and rang the crossing keeper in the adjacent crossing box who was happy to go and collect them and keep them in the box till he managed to get back for them.
Naturally as is the way of things the box is now abandoned and adorned with dead flower boxes and the all round old style bus shelter has been replaced with one with no sides that gives no weather protection.
I can't understand it. If the shop has the cards, then they're clearly not out there about to be used by criminals... unless Aldi doesn't trust its own staff. Which maybe is sensible...
I am sure that the banks take a different view on that. Maybe even something to do with the T&C of having/using a card
causton
Established Member
At my station, if a card is handed in an announcement will be made to see if the customer is still on the station. After some time (anytime between an hour and till the end of the day) the card will be cut up and logged so people will know the card was handed in and that it was destroyed.
Which is very cautious but you have to be these days, two staff from another company reportedly got sacked after finding a bag and putting it down as lost property in the correct manner - till the owner of the bag (and credit card inside) found out they had gone and bought fast food with the contactless card whilst on their break! So you can never be too careful.
I think the railway's motto is to trust nobody, not the staff, passengers, etc...
What exactly do the banks take a different view on?
Sure, if you've lost your cards you should cancel them.
But if you're a shop that finds the cards, why should you cut them up?
It’s to protect their staff from malicious or mistaken allegations.
bb21
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Imagine a break-in at the shop while they had the lost property in their possession...
Ah, I see.
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