Southern Advance - Cancelled Train help

[Fokx]

Still, I'm sure you would insist on paying the full public fare if you travelled on another TOC.

Personally I certainly do (or wait for the next TOC train if it’s an advance)

 

[Watershed]

Personally I certainly do (or wait for the next TOC train if it’s an advance)

I have to say, I'm surprised that you never buy tickets with your Priv discount. Seems like you are missing out there.

 

[Deafdoggie]

Although not directly comparable, many bus firms will carry one another's passengers in times of disruption or a brakedown. Often unofficially, but I've never known anyone get in trouble for it. It's good customer service and it's the right thing to do rather than leaving people stranded for an hour or more.

 

[Fokx]

I have to say, I'm surprised that you never buy tickets with your Priv discount. Seems like you are missing out there.

Occasionally it can be cheaper and easier (in terms of not having to queue at the booking office) to buy an advance than it is to purchases a PRIV.

Examples of this that I’ve tested include Avanti, Northern, Eurostar and Cal Sleeper. First class fares can also regularly be cheaper in advance form or with an advance ticket and weekend/seatfrog upgrade

 

[Watershed]

Occasionally it can be cheaper and easier (in terms of not having to queue at the booking office) to buy an advance than it is to purchases a PRIV.

Examples of this that I’ve tested include Avanti, Northern, Eurostar and Cal Sleeper. First class fares can also regularly be cheaper in advance form or with an advance ticket and weekend/seatfrog upgrade

But surely you still must use your Priv sometimes?

 

[221129]

But surely you still must use your Priv sometimes?

Not that it's relevant to anything. It's the same as any other Railcard really.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 18 Nov 2021 ==

At the end of the day when you buy an Advance ticket you are normally getting a cheaper ticket to restrict your journey in someway. If you want flexibility including in minor disruption, then you need to buy a ticket suitable for your needs.

 

[matt_world2004]

Considering all firebox revenue is going to the dft at the moment it is a bit rich to argue that there shouldn't be unifed fare structures across all national rail "franchises"

I wonder if it was an element of spite at being stripped of the southeastern franchise that GTR didn't arrange ticket acceptance in these circumstances.

 

[221129]

I wonder if it was an element of spite at being stripped of the southeastern franchise that GTR didn't arrange ticket acceptance in these circumstances.

The people that make these decisions won't care about anything like that...

 

[Starmill]

I wonder if it was an element of spite at being stripped of the southeastern franchise that GTR didn't arrange ticket acceptance in these circumstances.

Is it not more likely that it's just generally policy not to arrange alternatives for sub two hour delays?

Good customer service costs money and staff time. The position may well be that they could have arranged ticket acceptance but didn't believe that they had to so decided not to.

 

[matt_world2004]

The people that make these decisions won't care about anything like that...

Unless they have themselves lost reciprocal travel facilities on southeastern

 

[Western Sunset]

Good customer service costs money and staff time.

But it can also make money, by repeat travel, recommendations to friends about how well they were treated by staff, etc...

 

[Bletchleyite]

Good customer service costs money and staff time

That's called "knowing the price of everything and the value of nothing".

 

[Watershed]

Not that it's relevant to anything. It's the same as any other Railcard really.

Perhaps I wasn't clear - but I was alluding to the fact that the rail industry is demonstrably different to any other part of the transport industry, as there are reciprocal staff travel benefits available to (virtually) all TOC employees.

And that exactly the same staff who are happy to take advantage of that reciprocity when it suits them, think it's strange think that passengers might also want to take advantage of a similar principle during disruption. Res ipsa loquitor:

You wouldn’t expect this of airlines, buses or coach companies so I do find it strange when passengers expect this of the railway

At the end of the day when you buy an Advance ticket you are normally getting a cheaper ticket to restrict your journey in someway. If you want flexibility including in minor disruption, then you need to buy a ticket suitable for your needs.

The restriction is primarily that you must take the booked train(s). The fact that such tickets are often restricted to one or more named TOCs is neither here nor there to most passengers, and it's certainly not something they are likely to be particularly aware of.

When a train is cancelled, I don't think it's unreasonable to expect to get to your destination using the next available service, regardless of which colour that train happens to be.

 

[Bletchleyite]

When a train is cancelled, I don't think it's unreasonable to expect to get to your destination using the next available service, regardless of which colour that train happens to be.

Completely agreed. To be honest, my view is that an Advance should become an Any Permitted Anytime Day Single in the event that any of the booked trains (or suggested trains for connections) are cancelled or delayed such that a connection breaks, and that endorsing a ticket to do that should be easy (Deutsche Bahn just whack a "Zugbindung aufgehoben" (train restriction lifted) stamp on and it does exactly that).

 

[miklcct]

Not that it's relevant to anything. It's the same as any other Railcard really.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 18 Nov 2021 ==

At the end of the day when you buy an Advance ticket you are normally getting a cheaper ticket to restrict your journey in someway. If you want flexibility including in minor disruption, then you need to buy a ticket suitable for your needs.

A disruption, however minor, is a fault of the railway. The point of buying an advance ticket is to provide a fixed time journey with no flexibility , which will be perfect for time critical travellers such as the OP.

A travel insurance is useful here as well, but the railway has the responsibility to do whatever they can in order to minimise the effect of their fault.

 

[Starmill]

That's called "knowing the price of everything and the value of nothing".

Indeed so.

 

[30907]

In reality when the 15.28 was cancelled (points failure) the next Southern Service would have been the 16.00 to Brighton which has a connection at Hampden Park Sussex that gets in to Victoria at 18.05, 30 mins late.
The next Southeastern service gets you to Charing Cross where you have to walk to the District Line at Embankment and where the official connection to Victoria gets you there at 17.51.

In theory at least but my friend has no knowledge of the railway network in that area so unless it was mentioned by staff they wouldn't have known that this connection could have been made.

I imagine the staff at St Leonard's - who seem to be competent enough to manage a ticketing workaround - could have told them (1) to change at Orpington for Victoria, which would have been rather quicker and/or (2) change at Hampden Park for Victoria.

... an Advance should become an Any Permitted Anytime Day Single in the event that any of the booked trains (or suggested trains for connections) are cancelled or delayed such that a connection breaks, and that endorsing a ticket to do that should be easy (Deutsche Bahn just whack a "Zugbindung aufgehoben" (train restriction lifted) stamp on and it does exactly that).

I agree that the "same TOC only" rule should not apply in cases of disruption - but maybe only where the delay would be more than a certain amount. Memory says DB allow this from 20 minutes which IMO is very generous.

 

[kristiang85]

If you want flexibility including in minor disruption, then you need to buy a ticket suitable for your needs.

A passenger shouldn't have to pay for flexibility to cover the railway's failings, though.

 

[Bletchleyite]

A passenger shouldn't have to pay for flexibility to cover the railway's failings, though.

Exactly.

 

[WesternLancer]

When the Southern Service was cancelled shouldn't Southern Control have liaised with South Eastern to arrange ticket acceptance on the SET route?

Presumably Southern favoured paying any Delay -Repay claims that arose rather than potentially paying South Eastern to carry their passengers for them (if such liaising results in a charge from one TOC to another?). Or is it more likely that Southern Control did not consider it worth their time and effort to make such an arrangement with SET (as opposed to not wishing to pay for such an arrangement to be put in place).

With all TOCs under HM Govt control I would have thought that one thing the DfT could have done relatively easily would have been to issue an edict saying that when disruption occurs passengers can be given authority to travel on alternative services there will no longer be any financial exchange between TOCs necessary and this is in the passengers interest.

My hunch is best thing to do is an appeal to Southern Customer services for a payment as a good will gesture for the costs caused because their alternative provision would cause major inconvenience by meaning the passengers missed their onward connecting travel (albeit by another mode).

 

[Haywain]

Presumably Southern favoured paying any Delay -Repay claims that arose rather than potentially paying South Eastern to carry their passengers for them (if such liaising results in a charge from one TOC to another?). Or is it more likely that Southern Control did not consider it worth their time and effort to make such an arrangement with SET (as opposed to not wishing to pay for such an arrangement to be put in place).

My guess is that it was simply an oversight due to dealing with a lot of disruption. However, with the disruption one might have expected some ticket acceptance to be in place anyway.

 

[WesternLancer]

My guess is that it was simply an oversight due to dealing with a lot of disruption. However, with the disruption one might have expected some ticket acceptance to be in place anyway.

Thanks - instinct tells me you are correct Haywain. Mind you it seems ticket office staff at Hastings did not contact control to find out, which I guess they maybe could have done (perhaps not so easy as that eg if only one member of staff on duty at ticket office for example).

 

[Haywain]

Mind you it seems ticket office staff at Hastings did not contact control to find out, which I guess they maybe could have done (perhaps not so easy as that eg if only one member of staff on duty at ticket office for example).

In my experience it can be a lack of thinking that causes the problem. I'm always being told by people with nothing better to do that they are too busy to read emails and messages, or spend a few minutes on a phone call.

 

[paul1609]

My guess is that it was simply an oversight due to dealing with a lot of disruption. However, with the disruption one might have expected some ticket acceptance to be in place anyway.

One of the problems with the Marshlink and extremes of the Coastway is that Southern (GTR) management is a long way away. That have been said the maximum delay using the next Southern service was 30 minutes and it only affected passengers from 3 stations. The train was turned back at Bexhill because of a points failure in the Hastings area, the number of passengers affected would have been minimal.St Leonards is also a single maned station with one person operating the ticket office giving assistance etc.
If the customer had been booked on the 19.00 (or even 18.30 at a push) coach from Victoria the next Southern service would have been fine.

 

[Horizon22]

When the Southern Service was cancelled shouldn't Southern Control have liaised with South Eastern to arrange ticket acceptance on the SET route?

Presumably Southern favoured paying any Delay -Repay claims that arose rather than potentially paying South Eastern to carry their passengers for them (if such liaising results in a charge from one TOC to another?). Or is it more likely that Southern Control did not consider it worth their time and effort to make such an arrangement with SET (as opposed to not wishing to pay for such an arrangement to be put in place).

Only if it was a sustained thing. One train cancellation is normally unlikely; an exception to this might be a route with a very irregular service but there aren't loads of those where there's two operators. I have seen GWR and WMT and GWR and XC do it even for one journey between Plymouth - Exeter & Hereford - Worcester before, but not always; it depends on the wider situation. Normally because people just hop on the next available. The presence of Advances does make that trickier of course

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 18 Nov 2021 ==

One of the problems with the Marshlink and extremes of the Coastway is that Southern (GTR) management is a long way away. That have been said the maximum delay using the next Southern service was 30 minutes and it only affected passengers from 3 stations. The train was turned back at Bexhill because of a points failure in the Hastings area, the number of passengers affected would have been minimal.St Leonards is also a single maned station with one person operating the ticket office giving assistance etc.
If the customer had been booked on the 19.00 (or even 18.30 at a push) coach from Victoria the next Southern service would have been fine.

Don't really think that's an issue - there are specific Control teams that look over dedicated routes. All decisions are communicated virtually / remotely / by telephone anyway so that's a non-factor.

 

[NARobertson]

This story shows just how problematic limited-validity tickets can be. It also seems to show how much railways are focused on making the most money in the present at the possible expense of future lost custom through disenchanted passengers.

 

[Starmill]

When a train is cancelled, I don't think it's unreasonable to expect to get to your destination using the next available service, regardless of which colour that train happens to be.

Indeed. To the general public this is a baseline minimum. For some train enthusiasts that seems to be a very difficult concept however!

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 18 Nov 2021 ==

Only if it was a sustained thing. One train cancellation is normally unlikely; an exception to this might be a route with a very irregular service but there aren't loads of those where there's two operators.

As I pointed out it's generally arranged in cases of even just a single service being cancelled or short formed (where capacity on the shorter train is likely to be insufficient to fit everyone) by East Midlands Railway and TransPennine Express between Manchester or Stockport and Sheffield. No doubt a handful of other examples exist.

 

[paul1609]

Only if it was a sustained thing. One train cancellation is normally unlikely; an exception to this might be a route with a very irregular service but there aren't loads of those where there's two operators. I have seen GWR and WMT and GWR and XC do it even for one journey between Plymouth - Exeter & Hereford - Worcester before, but not always; it depends on the wider situation. Normally because people just hop on the next available. The presence of Advances does make that trickier of course

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 18 Nov 2021 ==



Don't really think that's an issue - there are specific Control teams that look over dedicated routes. All decisions are communicated virtually / remotely / by telephone anyway so that's a non-factor.

in theory maybe in practise the reality is something different.
It normally only takes one defective train to close the whole Southern Operation East of Eastbourne.
The service just stops nobody knows why, the few staff that there are or the customers.
The stations have notices saying that in the event of disruption it may take many hours to arrange replacement transport and if you can its best to make your own way and claim a refund.
All the Marshlink Stations are managed from Eastbourne up to 50 miles away. Customer Services are apparently in Ashby de la Zouch wherever that may be....

 

[island]

All the Marshlink Stations are managed from Eastbourne up to 50 miles away. Customer Services are apparently in Ashby de la Zouch wherever that may be....

Up Leicester way

 

[gray1404]

My understanding is that GTR Customer Services is based in Bristol. The department that deals with Delay Repay is based in Ashby-de-la-Zouch.