Advice on refund please

[fandroid]

I bought an offpeak day return today from Birmingham International to University. All went swimmingly until New Street. There it was apparent that the Cross City Line was down on the south side, and we were told normal service buses were accepting rail tickets.

Looking at the queue at the bus stop I decided to abandon, and got a taxi. I had a delivery to make near University station. That didnt take long, and I checked in the station there and it was still "no trains". I was going to use the New Street to International return portion as a starter for a train to Basingstoke. As it turned out I found a Cross-country train (via the Solihull route) to Reading and bought split tickets from the Forum site for that.

Should I be claiming a refund for the day return from the retailer (Trainsplit)?

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 11 Nov 2025 ==

I failed to mention that I grabbed a taxi back to New Street from University

 

[Mcr Warrior]

@fandroid. You should, I think, be entitled to a 50% refund, so £3.50 (with no deduction) if it was £7.00 that you'd paid. How easy the ticket retailer, that you've used, makes it for such refunds, due to disruption, I can't comment upon, or whether you should expect any reimbursement for the taxi fare that you paid.

 

[JBuchananGB]

An abandoned journey is, AFAIK, defined as turning round and going back. In that case there is a claim for a refund from the retailer. It seems that you didn't abandon the journey. You stopped short and continued using a taxi. On the way back, you have the unused return portion of your original ticket. You may be able to claim something for that, without an admin charge because it was unused due to disruption.

 

[MrJeeves]

An abandoned journey is, AFAIK, defined as turning round and going back. In that case there is a claim for a refund from the retailer. It seems that you didn't abandon the journey.

Spot on, and the NRCoT and industry rules helpfully leave the OP's situation as effectively "tough luck", much to the frustration of everyone involved.

50% of the ticket price for the disrupted return journey would be due here, in my view, as that portion was unused and new tickets were bought for the journey on CrossCountry.

 

[fandroid]

Thanks everyone. I work for a charity and the journey is on expenses, but I'm keen to reduce their burden by whatever amount is allowed. They'll pay for the taxis, as it was an urgent delivery and they know that these things happen.

 

[Starmill]

The only alternative I can see to the above is taking a single from Birmingham International to Birmingham away from a return from Birmingham International to University. This would appear to leave you worse off with just that small difference left, so I would leave that there.