Great Western Coffee Shop

A question I was asked yesterday at Melksham station ... I *think* I know the answer but may I check up here please.

Scenario.  A group travelled from Melksham to Swindon on the 09:20 on a Saturday morning (return tickets) , spend the day there, took in a sporting event, met up with friends thereafter, and went back to the station to catch the 21:08 back home ... to find it cancelled.   So they take the next train as far as Chippenham, on the understanding that there will be some sort of replacement transport available from there.   However, they are told that "we only organise replacement buses for busy / mainline trains", and are advised that they may like to take a taxi, get a receipt, and write in to claim it back.

Now - that's as told to me.  It's one heck of a business writing in, waiting for payment which may or may not be made, and indeed travellers may not have enough cash (over 20 pounds) with them having bought their rail ticket which they think gets them back to Melksham and lots of other things during the day.

It is true that substitute buses are only organised where there are a number of people, and it is true that people have the option of taking a taxi off their own bat and then asking the rail operator to pay back for it. But shouldn't one of the alternative of (a) we will put you on the 22:26 bus or (b) we will get you to your final station by taxi be offered, both at no additional expense to the customer who has already paid?

It looks as though - in this case - these options were only going to be available to people who wear "in the know" and prepared to stand on their rights - and in my view that's cheeky (within the letter but not the spirit of the rules) when an advertised service, for which payment has already been made, is not available.  "If it happens again tonight, we won't use the train again" said one of the group - a great shame, as the line's there for the customers, going to improve for the customers, and it's a darned site more sensible for them to use the train than for them to drive after an early evening on the town!!

If the rail operator would normally have to pay for a taxi or replacment bus if a train is canceled, I cannot see why the TOC couldn't pay the taxi driver up-front to get the passengers home.

I seem to remember a taxi being supplied for myself and other members of my family to get back to Pembrokeshire from Swansea late one evening (I can't remember why, I think we must have been delayed on an earlier train from somewhere further east).

When you buy a ticket you enter a contract with the rail company which means that they must get you from A to B by whatever means necessary. If they called the customer service number on a poster at the station then it should have been arranged for them. Failing that a taxi receipt should get your money back (albeit in vouchers)

I was on a First Bus in Cornwall recently, it was late evening and the 2355 from Truro heading West was cancelled or heavily delayed. (I believe it  may have ran through at something like 0200) The Driver of the 18 bus was accepting train tickets and delayed his bus to ensure leaving the train station bus stop at 2355.

Over the years I have twice missed the last Exmouth branch service from EXD due to a significant delay on the incoming mainline FGW service.

On both occasions a taxi was organised without my having to part with any money; the taxi driver was given a document which presumably allowed the company concerned to claim back their costs.

Thanks for those feedbacks - they rather confirm my view that some form of alternative transport as far as Melksham Station should have been offered - be it substitute bus or taxi - at no extra cost to the people who had already paid for transportation.   A seat on the scheduled bus about an hour later may have been sensible and acceptable too.  To only offer them the option to pay for a taxi themselves and reclaim really isn't right in the circumstances as told to me.

Again - qualified by "but I wasn't there" ... but strengthen by a very similar experience indeed that I had personally a few months back, and described on the forum.

A taxi or a bus should have been organized, whether proactively as one already waiting at the station or on request from the passengers to the station staff.  In smaller stations staff have to ring Control and it would have been authorized straight away, in bigger stations they have the authority already to order taxis.

The policy is to get them as far as possible by train and then by other means from there.  I once had a group of about 15 teenagers travelling from Newquay to Bristol, the train to Par was cancelled so it was arranged to take them as far as Exeter on the last train and then a couple of taxis were organized from there.  In the example you quote some road transport should have been provided, the only thing I would say they did wrong was to travel to Chippenham without asking at Swindon first, and that's assuming when you say "on the understanding that there will be some sort of replacement transport available from there" they concluded that without speaking to anybody...

And even then something should have been arranged.