Great Western Coffee Shop

I suspect we have had a thread on this before, but searching "even" I could not find the link

Question - if I travel on "split tickets" - tickets A to B and B to C with the train I am on calling at B (and I may have to change there)  and my train or trains get cancelled or delayed, or I get delayed by an official connection missing and I arrive over 15 minutes late at C,  am I entitled to a delay/repay payment

a) for the whole A to C journey
b) for the B to C journey
c) for the A to B journey if it was very late there, even if it got to C less than 15 minutes late

From National Rail


My understanding is that this is a journey issue,  and that compensation is claimable and it says in the national rail paragraph for the journey - and that's irrespective of the ticket(s) you are using.   So (for example) I travel from Trowbridge to Swindon on time, change there to a London express that calls as Didcot but gets held up because of a points failure at Hayes and Harlington and arrives 35 minutes late in London, I can make a claim for a partial refund of both my Trowbridge - Didcot and Didcot - London ticket.

However, at WWRUG in Trowbridge on Wednesday evening this question was raised, and one of the members showed me a long explanation written by a member of booking office staff explaining that the customer should not buy a split ticket for a journey as he would then only be able to claim back from the final portion if his train arrived very late into C - he could not get compensation for the whole journey, nor if a connection at B missed because his A to B train was a few minutes late and did not connect, even if he had allowed the official change time there.

We all agreed that the best solution for the railways to reduce delay / repay refunds is to run the trains more on time - having said which, can anyone tell me what the official answer is?

I've successfully claimed on split tickets many times through GWR and would take the view that the Conditions of Carriage make clear that it is one "journey". The GWR Delay Repay form allows separate tickets to be entered, with a fare and ticket type entered for each and I've had no problem claiming for single+return+season combinations!

Through other TOCs it is more difficult as there is sometimes only space to upload one ticket. I have made a claim with Southern where I submitted a photo showing two tickets which were both returns, so I could choose the return option. On these forms I've never bothered to claim for more exotic combinations. In one case where I had return+season both legs were delayed equally so I claimed both separately. In other cases with such TOCs I've sometimes just cut my losses and claimed for the "main" delayed leg.

If I stood to lose a lot by not claiming for a more complex combinations  with one of those TOCs I would probably submit it as best I can, wait for the system to reject and appeal, but the more 'complex' claims I've had have been through GWR so it hasn't been an issue.

My wife recently travelled from Bristol to Derby with ticket split, as you would expect, at Cheltenham. The lines were closed between Bristol and Gloucester on the day, so she ended up being diverted via Severn Tunnel Jct and was just over two hours late at Derby.

There was a certain amount of toing and froing with Cross Country, who initially denied that she could have been delayed that much - but she was able to provide screenshots of online evidence (which was of course available to Cross Country!) proving her case. In the end she got something like £69 back on an £84 fare - so not the full refund, but it seemed reasonable.

The Rail Delivery Group briefing document is quite clear:
Anything to the contrary is the result of people / organisations making up their own rules.

But that does mean that a delay on A to B, but not on B to C (the wait at B means that a connection would still be made), would mean no Delay/Repay on A to B

That would be the theory of it, yes.   But then if you split at "B" with the intent of nipping out of the station to the flower shop on station approach to get a bunch of flowers for your date when you go to "C", and weren't able to do so, you could treat the trip as two journeys and claim.   Might be the smallest of your worries if you date was expecting flowers and you appeared empty handed - could be lifechanging!

....and claim only for the delay A to B. nothing for B to C as you'd have to catch the following service.

That depends on the big and personal decision you make - is you date going to be most unhappy if you turn up without flowers, or turn up late?   Delay / Repay can be a very poor and limited compensation for the consequences of trains not running to timetable.