Permitted Connecting Times Between Stations

[hollharrington]

Agreed, but it depends what stations you put in the "from" and "to" fields. By the way, I have, in the past, claimed for a journey from Tottenham Court Road to Slade Green where the delay occurred on the Abbey Wood to Slade Green leg (caused by Thameslink cancelling a train). I ended up submitting a paper claim because Thameslink's online delay repay form won't accept Tottenham Court Road as an origin. They specifically told me I should have entered Abbey Wood as my origin, despite the fact I had made it clear to them I was making a through journey from Tottenham Court Road. I should be clear that, on that occasion, the delay was 15-29 minutes irrespective of whether you consider the through journey or just the final Abbey Wood to Slade Green leg, but the point is, GTR obviously think it's okay to cherry pick the delayed part of the journey and I have an email from them that proves it.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 14 Jan 2026 ==


To try to get this thread back on track, for future reference, if you ever need to know what the minimum connection times are in future, an easy way to check is on brtimes.com. Enter the name of the station, select "station info" and click search. It will tell you the minimum connection time (MCT) for connections at the station and will also tell you about "fixed links" to other stations (minimum times needed for recognised transfers that can be made on foot or by tube).

Don't expect logic or consistency: the amount of time you have to allow when crossing London is often padded to the point of being faintly ridiculous (since the fixed link minimum times and the MCTs for both stations must all be added together). At the same time, some are actually a bit too short (e.g. connecting from Whitechapel Elizabeth Line to Fenchurch Street via the Tube is 5 minutes transfer time plus 5 minutes for the connection at Whitechapel and 7 minutes for the connection at Fenchurch St - giving an optimistic 17 minutes).

thank you! this is literally all i wanted to know - how to find out these times. thanks so much

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 16 Jan 2026 ==

Hi all

Does anyone have any knowledge on how many minutes train companies “allow” to make connections between stations? My delay repay is failing as operator is saying I boarded my connecting train (ultimately delayed) quicker than I should have?!

Thanks in advance

thanks to everyone helping! the issue was that as this was my return journey (open return ticket) i had no itinerary so was unsure what connections i “should” have got in the eyes of the train operators. thanks again