Charged twice by EastCoast

[Teapotalot]

Hi,

I'm looking for some advice.

Myself and my boyfriend were booked onto the 15.00 Eastcoast Train from Edinburgh to London Kings Cross. We paid £50 each and reserved two bike spaces.

When reaching the train with the booking confirmation the Train Guard explained we needed to print the tickets associated with the confirmation to get on the train. He was of course right. But having spent two weeks cycling Lands End to John O'Groats my brain must have been a bit frazzled, and with the lack of barriers at Edinburgh station I was fooled by being able to walk straight up to the train without retrieving the tickets. The train guard looked at my reservation, said we really needed the tickets, but on this occasion he'd accept it and told us to secure our bikes and hop on.

30 mins into the journey the same guard was doing his ticket inspection rounds and explained my confirmation was not valid for travel and we needed actual tickets. Obviously that was now impossible as we'd left the station. After a lengthy (and remarkably calm and polite) discussion we were forced to pay a further £125 each for new tickets home. He fully accepted we'd made an innocent mistake and that we had paid for tickets already, but that was tough and my old tickets are void because I didn't collect them.

Frustrating because he knew and accepted that I only had the confirmation at the point of loading the bikes. Had he explained that our piece of paper would not count for much as far as we, as passengers, were concerned, we could have got to a ticket collection machine before leaving the station.

Now the T&Cs do put me in the wrong, but this is clearly incredibly unfair. We had paid £100, then were forced to pay a further £250. I know many people have suffered at the hands of train company conditions that seem to verge on the almost unlawful. Anyone have any advice on where I can go to dispute this? I am in the process of formulating an email to the East Coast customer services obviously, but I already know their response. There must be a watchdog for this sort of thing surely?

Many thanks in advance...

 

[strawberry]

Write to customer services. Best case scenario they will give you rail vouchers for the set of tickets not printed (I'm assuming they are advance and there is no refund on this type of tickets)

 

[Flying Snail]

Hi,

I'm looking for some advice.

Myself and my boyfriend were booked onto the 15.00 Eastcoast Train from Edinburgh to London Kings Cross. We paid £50 each and reserved two bike spaces.

When reaching the train with the booking confirmation the Train Guard explained we needed to print the tickets associated with the confirmation to get on the train. He was of course right. But having spent two weeks cycling Lands End to John O'Groats my brain must have been a bit frazzled, and with the lack of barriers at Edinburgh station I was fooled by being able to walk straight up to the train without retrieving the tickets. The train guard looked at my reservation, said we really needed the tickets, but on this occasion he'd accept it and told us to secure our bikes and hop on.

30 mins into the journey the same guard was doing his ticket inspection rounds and explained my confirmation was not valid for travel and we needed actual tickets. Obviously that was now impossible as we'd left the station. After a lengthy (and remarkably calm and polite) discussion we were forced to pay a further £125 each for new tickets home. He fully accepted we'd made an innocent mistake and that we had paid for tickets already, but that was tough and my old tickets are void because I didn't collect them.

Frustrating because he knew and accepted that I only had the confirmation at the point of loading the bikes. Had he explained that our piece of paper would not count for much as far as we, as passengers, were concerned, we could have got to a ticket collection machine before leaving the station.

Now the T&Cs do put me in the wrong, but this is clearly incredibly unfair. We had paid £100, then were forced to pay a further £250. I know many people have suffered at the hands of train company conditions that seem to verge on the almost unlawful. Anyone have any advice on where I can go to dispute this? I am in the process of formulating an email to the East Coast customer services obviously, but I already know their response. There must be a watchdog for this sort of thing surely?

Many thanks in advance...

A booking printout alone is not valid for travel so really the only issue here of any merit is the Guard authorising you to travel with it (which he is entitled to do) and then changing his mind insisting you pay for new tickets.

Had you not been authorised there would be no issue here, new tickets would be the correct outcome as there is no way for the guard to know if the ticket had been printed and given to other passengers.

The question is why did the guard authorise travel then go back on it.

Are you sure it was the same person?
What did he say when you asked why he was changing his mind?

If you go to seek a refund the guard will be contacted, from the conversation that took place do you think will he confirm that he had initially allowed you travel on the booking alone and only recinded after the journey began.

BTW That last paragraph is rather pointless and unhelpful, if you engage in that sort of rhetoric you are less likely to be looked upon seriously as a genuine case rather than someone with an axe to grind.

My own take, assuming that everything happened exactly as you state and you were clearly authorised to travel on the booking alone, is that you shouldn't have subsequently been charged.

 

[bb21]

I agree that taking the matter up with Customer Service is likely to be the most productive route.

The difficulty for you is that it is your word against the guard's. There is no guarantee which way the decision will go. While I understand your frustration, and I would feel equally aggrieved had it been me in that situation, it is almost impossible to prove that you were verbally authorised to travel without your ticket should the guard deny it.

However all is not lost. Should they decide that you were correctly charged, there is still the possibility of them giving you a refund or Rail Travel Voucher for goodwill.

Do I see you mention the word "watchdog"? That would be Passenger Focus, but you are forewarned not to expect much.

 

[34D]

About five years ago, I had a remarkably similar experience in Doncaster.

At the time, I was working for a railway company, so had legitimately used a shortcut to the platform and not passed the machines. A train to my station was in the platform. This was approx 6pm. I asked the guard if he could sell me a ticket on board. He said yes.

Once the doors closed it was a different story. Anytime, prosecution, or anytime to the next stop and chucked off.

As a layman, I would apply the word entrapment to both my and your situation. Others will disagree

 

[35B]

I agree that taking the matter up with Customer Service is likely to be the most productive route.

The difficulty for you is that it is your word against the guard's. There is no guarantee which way the decision will go. While I understand your frustration, and I would feel equally aggrieved had it been me in that situation, it is almost impossible to prove that you were verbally authorised to travel without your ticket should the guard deny it.

However all is not lost. Should they decide that you were correctly charged, there is still the possibility of them giving you a refund or Rail Travel Voucher for goodwill.

Do I see you mention the word "watchdog"? That would be Passenger Focus, but you are forewarned not to expect much.

It may be, but I'm in correspondence with East Coast about an excess they've charged me where their customer services are taking a very hard line, to the extent that they're ignoring key and provable facts to support the approach taken by theb guard who levied the excess. Given comments in other recent threads, I suspect they're now refusing to apply any discretion.

 

[bb21]

All depends on who you get.

 

[maniacmartin]

Have you since collected the tickets? If they were booked from EC and not collected, they should be able to tell that they are unused, and the date and time of printing of the tickets that were sold on board will make it obvious you were on that train.

Failing that, get the original tickets refunded as they were not used (minus £10 admin fee). This will leave you out of pocket, but not by as much.

If the events transpired how you describe, then you didn't need to collect the tickets, as permission from a member of railway staff acting in the course of their duties is a valid defense from both a Byelaw and Regulation of Railways Act prosecution. Of course it is impossible to prove after the fact what was said.

 

[bb21]

Failing that, get the original tickets refunded as they were not used (minus £10 admin fee). This will leave you out of pocket, but not by as much.

At £50 per ticket, highly likely that they are Advance tickets, which are non-refundable.

 

[IanXC]

Do I see you mention the word "watchdog"? That would be Passenger Focus, but you are forewarned not to expect much.

I must say that whilst Passenger Focus are usually as much use as the proverbial teapot in anything complex, I think they could add value to this case if East Coast customer services do not resolve it.

 

[Flying Snail]

About five years ago, I had a remarkably similar experience in Doncaster.

At the time, I was working for a railway company, so had legitimately used a shortcut to the platform and not passed the machines. A train to my station was in the platform. This was approx 6pm. I asked the guard if he could sell me a ticket on board. He said yes.

Once the doors closed it was a different story. Anytime, prosecution, or anytime to the next stop and chucked off.

As a layman, I would apply the word entrapment to both my and your situation. Others will disagree

I would apply the word stupid. There are plenty of situations dealing with the public that require confrontation, there is no need to go around engineering ones yourself to add to the tally.

 

[GadgetMan]

Hi,

I'm looking for some advice.

Myself and my boyfriend were booked onto the 15.00 Eastcoast Train from Edinburgh to London Kings Cross. We paid £50 each and reserved two bike spaces.

When reaching the train with the booking confirmation the Train Guard explained we needed to print the tickets associated with the confirmation to get on the train. He was of course right. But having spent two weeks cycling Lands End to John O'Groats my brain must have been a bit frazzled, and with the lack of barriers at Edinburgh station I was fooled by being able to walk straight up to the train without retrieving the tickets. The train guard looked at my reservation, said we really needed the tickets, but on this occasion he'd accept it and told us to secure our bikes and hop on.

30 mins into the journey the same guard was doing his ticket inspection rounds and explained my confirmation was not valid for travel and we needed actual tickets. Obviously that was now impossible as we'd left the station. After a lengthy (and remarkably calm and polite) discussion we were forced to pay a further £125 each for new tickets home. He fully accepted we'd made an innocent mistake and that we had paid for tickets already, but that was tough and my old tickets are void because I didn't collect them.

Frustrating because he knew and accepted that I only had the confirmation at the point of loading the bikes. Had he explained that our piece of paper would not count for much as far as we, as passengers, were concerned, we could have got to a ticket collection machine before leaving the station.

Now the T&Cs do put me in the wrong, but this is clearly incredibly unfair. We had paid £100, then were forced to pay a further £250. I know many people have suffered at the hands of train company conditions that seem to verge on the almost unlawful. Anyone have any advice on where I can go to dispute this? I am in the process of formulating an email to the East Coast customer services obviously, but I already know their response. There must be a watchdog for this sort of thing surely?

Many thanks in advance...

How long before departure time did you first interact with the Guard? If you'd then gone to print tickets from a machine would you have got back to your booked train on time?

Finally are you certain you hadn't opted for the Print at Home option which means you wouldn't then have been able to collect from a ticket machine? The reason for asking is you say the Guard said you had to 'print' your tickets rather than 'collect' them.

 

[Flamingo]

At the risk of asking the obvious question, were you defenitly on your booked train, and was anything like missing railcards in the mix?

 

[reb0118]

I could be wrong here but I have the feeling that we are dealing with two separate but related scenarios:-

1) The original conversation may have been to do with the lack of cycle reservations printed on normal ticket stock and the guard accepting e.g. an email confirmation and allowing the bikes on board.

And,

2) The passengers being subsequently unable to produce a valid ticket on board the train.

Just a thought.

 

[ModernRailways]

I could be wrong here but I have the feeling that we are dealing with two separate but related scenarios:-

1) The original conversation may have been to do with the lack of cycle reservations printed on normal ticket stock and the guard accepting e.g. an email confirmation and allowing the bikes on board.

And,

2) The passengers being subsequently unable to produce a valid ticket on board the train.

Just a thought.

This is highly likely and something I was thinking whilst reading the OP.

If you don't get anywhere with the normal customer services, Twitter tends to be a good way. The people who are on their tend to be a lot nicer and a lot more human in their response.

I had a similar experience on TPE. My tickets wouldn't print from any TVMs , so I pulled up the East Coast website with my order and showed the guard. I asked him politely 'My tickets aren't being printed from the TVMs. Would I be able to get on to XX station as per my reservation?' He proceeded to let me on, but he then comes around and asks for my ticket. I explained again, and that I had spoken to him and he said 'Oh no, you will need to buy a full anytime ticket or receive a fine.' I opted for the fine, which turned out to be a UPFN. He took all my details etc. and about 2 weeks later received a letter asking for me to pay up. After going back and forth with someone on the phone I wrote a sarcastic tweet to TPE's Twitter. They investigated and about 6 hours later they told me it was cancelled and sent me £20 in RTVs.

 

[yorkie]

I've activated Teapotalot's PMs, sent him/her an offer of help, but not heard anything back. Rather like the other East Coast case. So I suspect we'll never know....

 

[Teapotalot]

Dear All,

Thanks for all your responses and suggestions. Apologies in my delay to respond. Was a little overwhelmed by how helpful you all were plus also wanted to await a reply from East coast before getting too caught up in this too. The case has been settled and here's how we got on...

Although I held out little hope, I did follow your advice of at least starting by contacting the Customer Services team first.

They confirmed that they were correct to have charged us again, but also accepted that we were mislead by the Train Guard. I expected to be disappointed by the experience and at the very best hoped for perhaps a good-will gesture of a voucher for our unused tickets (totalling £100) - which wouldn't have been a terrible outcome. But to my utter surprise and their upmost credit they agreed to a full refund for the £250 we were forced to spend whilst on the train…just this once obviously. No quibbling, no back and forth.

I had a low opinion of train companies when it comes to stuff like this, especially East Coast, but have been taught to at least give them a chance…they may just surprise you! This has transformed from a relatively disastrous journey to an actually quite pleasant experience. It's a shame we had the bad experience at all, but I am thoroughly impressed and appreciative of how the Customer Services team have turned this around. And I have learnt a valuable lesson when it comes to printing tickets!

Thanks again to everyone who took the time to respond and also East Coast (if anyone there is reading this).

Many thanks,
Nicola

 

[bb21]

Thanks for telling us the outcome. That was a very good result.

 

[Greenback]

Nicola, I'm delighted that you managed to secure a very good outcome.

 

[Clip]

Thats a good result, well done.

 

[ModernRailways]

Great result! I've always found East Coast helpful with this kind of thing. Thanks for getting back to us too!

 

[talldave]

Great result, but I do think online reservation confirmations could be a bit more blunt about the need to turn a booking reference into a ticket before getting on the train.

 

[Tom B]

Great result, but I do think online reservation confirmations could be a bit more blunt about the need to turn a booking reference into a ticket before getting on the train.

I'm fairly certain there is a prominent warning on the confirmation email, although I don't have one to hand to check.

This would stop those who genuinely think that the booking confirmation code is acceptable in lieu of a ticket and thus don't uplift them. However, this wouldn't stop situations (like the OPs) where the tickets are not uplifted due to the passenger forgetting, or being preoccupied with other things, or whatever.

At least common sense and discretion has been applied.

 

[najaB]

Great result, but I do think online reservation confirmations could be a bit more blunt about the need to turn a booking reference into a ticket before getting on the train.

The first line of TheTrainLine confirmation emails has, in large bold print: "*This is confirmation of your booking and is not your travel ticket. "

That's pretty clear to me.

Edit to add:
Virgin Trains have in bold, red, large text: "Please note this is NOT your ticket" and a pictogram below showing how to collect your tickets.
Scotrail don't make it so clear, it's a bit further down the page: "This email is not a valid ticket for travel.", however they do have in bold print at the bottom of the email: "To collect your tickets, you must have both the credit/debit card used to purchase the tickets and your ticket booking reference. If you do not have them, a new ticket at the full fare will have to be bought to travel..."

I don't have a recent East Coast confirmation email to hand, but I'm pretty sure they have something similar.

 

[talldave]

As usual, it's just Southern who are bad then? Their email starts with pointless crap about payment security, then in caps tells you to take a note of your booking reference (without mentioning that it's not your ticket). By the time the email gets onto ToD and collection most readers, especially non native English speakers, will have slipped into a coma.

 

[hassaanhc]

As usual, it's just Southern who are bad then? Their email starts with pointless crap about payment security, then in caps tells you to take a note of your booking reference (without mentioning that it's not your ticket). By the time the email gets onto ToD and collection most readers, especially non native English speakers, will have slipped into a coma.

It does not make it 100% clear the email is not a ticket! There is also a contradiction about using any card or only using the one used for payment.

My bolds below in a sample email of theirs:

* Booking reference: J6HLG265 *
* * *
* Hello Hassaan, *
* * *
* We're delighted you've decided to travel with us and thank you for booking online at southernrailway.com. Please take a moment to check your details below to ensure the information is correct. *
* * *
* Your booking details *
* * *
* Journey: 1 London Terminals to Nottingham @ £24.45
ADVANCE £15.20 (1 @ £15.20)
With 1 16-25 Railcard railcard(s)
Remember to bring the railcard(s) for the journey
ADVANCE £6.60 (1 @ £6.60)
With 1 16-25 Railcard railcard(s)
Remember to bring the railcard(s) for the journey
PlusBus for Nottingham on Wed, Jul 2nd £2.65
*
* Your Payment Card ****7226 has been charged £24.45 *
*
* Journey: 1 London Terminals to Nottingham
Ticket type: EC Std Advance Valid only on your chosen service. Not refundable. Changeable prior to date of travel for a fee.
Route: EC & CONNECTNS
Outward journey: 2 Jul 2014
departs London Kings Cross at 08:35 travel by Train service provider East Coast to station Grantham arrives 09:39 ( seats reserved: Coach: B Seats: 17 )
departs Grantham at 09:58 travel by Train service provider East Midland Trains to station Nottingham arrives 10:35 ( seats reserved: Coach: A Seats: 21A )
Ticket type: Standard Advance Valid only on your chosen service. Not refundable. Changeable prior to date of travel for a fee.
Route: Via East Midlands Trains Only.
Return journey: 2 Jul 2014
departs Nottingham at 16:30 travel by Train service provider East Midland Trains to station London St Pancras arrives 18:15 ( seats reserved: Coach: A Seats: 02A )
*
* You have chosen to collect your tickets from London Kings Cross. Your Booking Reference is J6HLG265
You will need to take your Booking Reference and the payment card you used for the booking to collect your ticket. Please note if you paid using an e voucher, you can use any payment card with a magnetic strip on the reverse to collect your tickets.
*
* To collect your tickets you can Use any credit/debit card and your ticket booking reference. Tickets cannot be issued without both of these items.
*
* * *
* More information *
* * *
* Our terms and conditions and the National Rail Conditions of Carriage apply to this booking. Please visit southernrailway.com for more details. *
* * *
* If you have chosen to collect your ticket from a Ticket Vending*Machine or Ticket Office (Ticket on Departure delivery option) please remember you will need your booking reference and any debit/credit card. *
* * *
* If you have chosen recorded or special delivery you can Track and Trace your ticket. *
* * *
* You can login to your account to view details of your booking at any time.

Sent from my SM-T210 using Tapatalk

 

[ModernRailways]

The East Coast email is exactly the same as Southern's. Could it be that Southern, and East Coast have the same format because they are using the same booking system?

Just had a look at my East Coast booking and nothing to say I need to pick up my tickets, other than in the small print - literally the third from last line. It isn't in bold and doesn't stand out.

 

[najaB]

Just had a look at my East Coast booking and nothing to say I need to pick up my tickets, other than in the small print - literally the third from last line. It isn't in bold and doesn't stand out.

I don't know if I agree with that - the fact that there's a whole section titled "ticket collection" is s big hint that you need to collect your tickets. Could it be more prominent? Yes. But I would not say it is hidden.

 

[talldave]

Yet again at Gatwick yesterday I saw passengers holding printouts of email confirmations trying to get through the ticket barriers and being re-directed to the collection machines. So it's an ongoing problem.

 

[maniacmartin]

I think the screenshots are pretty clear myself