Who has liability to get you home?

[Max]

A story of conflicting information, internal arguments and poor customer service. In a case involving a number of TOCs, who has the responsibility to get you home? What happens when two TOCs refuse a taxi on the basis of false information? And what happens when online journey planners conflict with information available to TOCs? You can read about it all in the latest instalment of theticketcollector!

http://theticketcollector.wordpress.com/2009/01/12/liability-for-getting-you-home/

 

[Pumbaa]

Was this you Max?

 

[glynn80]

Hmm, in my opinion the TOC responsible to pay for the taxi is Hull Trains as their train was the delayed service that caused you to miss your bus connection at Brough. Even though it was a TPE train that delayed the Hull Trains service, Hull Trains will receive compensation through the delay attribution scheme and will be sorted out separately.

The NRCC states the following:
If disruption caused by circumstances within the control of a Train Company or
a Rail Service Company leaves you stranded before you have reached your
destination and the Train Company whose trains you are entitled to use is unable
to get you to that destination by other means, any Train Company which is in a
position to help will, if it reasonably can, either arrange to get you to that
destination, or provide overnight accommodation for you.

Now the TOC in a position to help was TPE as they were the TOC who operate Hull station and I would say they "reasonably" could as the journey was 3.5 mile taxi ride.

Northern in this case really had nothing to do with the taxi issue and they certainly shouldn't have been paying for the taxi!

 

[Metroland]

TOC where you missed your connection should pay for that (and claim back though the various systems) if the online journey planner says its valid. Rather like 'reasonable route', given by the same system.

Obviously its possible to see why they wanted to wriggle out of of it, but these mix ups can be common with engineering work. Its not unknown for two timetables to turn up in signalboxes or control centres, it really depends whether there have been mistakes on the clerical side. These things happen from time-to-time, they shouldn't have really quibbled.

 

[metrocammel]

You can also see why Hull Trains probably want to wriggle out of it, as it is more clerical work for them. Fair enough, they will get re-imbursed by whoever caused the delay, but that involves man-hours to achieve. I suppose as Hull Trains are a small company, it would probably mean the person in control may well be the person responsible for sourcing the delay- which would mean more work for him- which he probably didn't want to do!
It doesn't make it right, however, and I would seriously suggest making a formal complaint to Hull Trains. Afterall, the issue was resolved by TPE in the end, who weren't obliged to organise a taxi. I wonder which company ended up paying for Max's taxi in the end?

 

[Metroland]

In a way it doesn't matter, every minute of delay is attributed to someone on the railway with a name next to it, who has to pay who. Delays cost around £9-60 a minute which goes into a central pot for reasons like calling taxis, refunds, compensation and so on. Everyone has X minutes of delay allocated against their name or at least their manager. This info can be accessed via TOPS.

The image is the modern railway is unaccountable, it is very accountable. Even when there are incidents not the responsibility of an individual, it can be seen from this system who is good at getting things back running again and minimising delay - especially important for train crew managers, S&T, signallers and controllers.

 

[Mojo]

In a way it doesn't matter, every minute of delay is attributed to someone on the railway with a name next to it, who has to pay who. Delays cost around £9-60 a minute which goes into a central pot for reasons like calling taxis, refunds, compensation and so on. Everyone has X minutes of delay allocated against their name or at least their manager. This info can be accessed via TOPS.

I think it may be more than that. I was told that Virgin West Coast pay £150 per minute and CrossCountry £100 per minute.

Was looking on the system yesterday at a CrossCountry train and at the bottom it said that it was delayed due to it being stuck behind [headcode] and as a result was then diverted.

 

[yorkie]

HT will have made a huge profit, I reckon.

£100s compo for delayed train, £0 in refunds as the bus arrived 1 minute early! Pax for Selby, Howden, and Brough can't really claim for 20 minutes delay either. So all they need to do is refuse to pay for Max's taxi (after all TPE are the ones manning the station who have to talk to him) and it's all pure profit! nice....:roll:

 

[John_158]

I had a Situation once where i was on my home bound jorney from London to Liverpool and Had to Change at Crewe and Manchester and the Crewe-Manchester , Northern Service was delayed missing my conection at Manchester Pic where i had an hours wait for the FTPE serivce and when we got to Warrington Ctl the Northern Rail 156 broke down ahead of the FTPE Service.

We had to wait in the freezing cold at Warrington Ctl for an hour becuse the FTPE Service turned back there due to the broken down train ahead.

I complained to Northern and they sent me a £10.00 Rail Voucher for My two hour delay and for My £13.00 Ticket was quite a good refund.

 

[anthony263]

i have gone to Swansea railways station to travel on the 11:10 swansea to cardiff stopping train as far as pyle but since this was cancelled the staff advised me to travel on teh 11:55 manchester train to bridgend then get the swansea train from bridgend to pyle, which didnt cost me a thing. arriva have always providied a bus/taxi to replace the train if is cancelled or try to get you on an alternative train.