CrossCountry delay repay 23/6/2024

[NormalPerson7]

I've been a long time lurker of this forum, and have learnt an awful lot about the railways from all you knowledgeable folk here.

Yesterday (22 June) I travelled from Chester to Oxford, and today I returned to Chester, both with my mother who is a bit of a nervous traveller. Yesterday we arrived in Oxford 34 minutes late due to early morning Avanti cancellations out of Chester, nothing unusual there. Avanti's delay repay claim form is easy-to-use with split tickets, so I've already made a claim for a 30-59 minute delay for both of us.

This afternoon, we attempted to make the return journey with the following itinerary:
1339 Oxford -> Birmingham New Street 1446 (CrossCountry) (actually 1404->1508)
1507 Birmingham New Street -> Crewe 1605 (Avanti)
1615 Crewe -> Chester 1637 (Transport for Wales)

with split, railcard-discounted Off-Peak Returns Chester->Stafford, Stafford->Leamington Spa, and Leamington Spa->Oxford (price £52.65 each).

In reality the 1339 was both late and extremely overcrowded, to the point we were unable to board (I hear this is nothing unusual with 4-car CrossCountry trains). I was prepared for this being a possibility, and I took a couple of photos of the overcrowding before the doors closed, so if necessary I can prove we were unable to board. Had we been able to board, I believe we would have arrived in Chester at 1727. In practice, foreseeing further issues with the 1439 not yet having departed Eastleigh, I decided to abandon CrossCountry and travel as follows:
1418 Oxford -> Banbury 1450 (GWR)
1513 Banbury -> Birmingham Moor Street 1611 (Chiltern)
1635 Birmingham New Street -> Crewe 1732 (LNWR)
1735 Crewe -> Chester 1755 (TfW) (actually arriving 1759)

Consequently we arrived 82 minutes late and should be eligible for (an additional) 50% of the ticket price in delay repay compensation from CrossCountry. I note that had we waited for the 1439 (actually 1536) CrossCountry service, or missed either of the two unofficial connections in our actual itinerary, we would have arrived even later, at 1851. I have two questions

1. What is the best way to make this claim, in light of the fact that it was (at least in part) due to being physically unable to board a train which ran? Has anyone had experience of attempting a claim like this with CrossCountry? I am guessing it's likely to be a long and drawn-out process to get more than the 25% compensation that would be based on a final arrival at 1727.
2. How should I fill out CrossCountry's awful online form for 2 people with these split e-tickets for best results?

 

[island]

I would suggest not using the DelayRepay claim system and instead sending a general customer services enquiry explaining the situation. Automated DelayRepay processing is liable to fail to recognize the inability to join a train due to crowding.

 

[dd1]

Some TOCs have the reason "Train too busy to board" available on their Delay Repay form, and some other TOCs (such as CrossCountry) don't.

A few months ago I asked for compensation from CrossCountry for the delay on these grounds (overcrowding). I sent them an email with a picture of my tickets attached and all other details that the form would otherwise require. They paid out promptly (no "long and drawn-out process").

 

[robbeech]

Cross country (from my experience) are one of those operators that set up their systems to reject most claims that aren’t simple straight forward on and off on one ticket. This certainly isn’t out of the ordinary and I suspect that this process nets them millions of pounds each year when people give up. They are however one of the ones that will accept and pay out when you can finally give a real world explanation to a human. That said they did accept a claim of mine a couple of months ago and then just fail to pay the money into my bank account forcing me to get back in touch, but that was subsequently settled.

 

[NormalPerson7]

Thanks for your advice everyone. I went through the customer services form you mentioned, which got me a response relatively promptly.

However, after a bit of back-and-forth with the customer services agent to explain the tickets I held, and despite them apparently now understanding my claim, they've now just asked me to go through the normal Delay Repay form anyway as it "will be able to calculate the compensation you are entitled to". Not helpful, as it's just going to get rejected by that system because the train ran.

That said, to my surprise, it looks like CrossCountry's delay repay form has recently been dramatically improved, to match the standard of Avanti West Coast etc, so I am at least now able to upload multiple tickets. I've sent an email to the customer service agent giving them the claim reference, and asked them to ensure that it is resolved correctly via their internal channels. It seems like a hopeless endeavour to me, but perhaps worth a try.

 

[Crighton]

I had a very similar issue to yours which you might find helpful and got back the full amount from XC as I could not board their train

On 25th April I travelled from Chester to Wokingham. Due to shenanigans at Stafford I arrived in Wokingham at 2103 rather than the expected 2003. I would like some help knowing what I should be claiming and how to do it please.

The proposed journey was:

1632 Avanti Chester to Stafford ar. 1713
1721 XC Stafford to Reading ar. 1941
1957 GWR Reading to Wokingham ar. 2003

For this I had 3 tickets from the forum’s trainsplit service:

Chester to Birmingham International, Anytime Single 1st, 1 adult @ £58.60
Birmingham International to Banbury, Anytime Day Single 1st, 1 adult @ £29.30
Banbury to Wokingham, Anytime Day Single 1st, 1 adult @ £55.00

Total £142.90 (+ additional £21.51 savings fee)


At Stafford,

• the 1721 (Manchester to Reading XC service) came in crowded - I subsequently learnt that the 1700 Manchester to Bristol Temple Meads XC service had been cancelled between Manchester and Birmingham which explains the severe crowding.
• First Class was advertised as being at the front of the train. When it arrived, First Class was not at the front but at the back, so I went along the platform to board First only to find that the main door was locked out of use
• I went to the guard’s door to ask if I could board First there. He informed me that the First class carriage was out of operation and I should board Standard Class and claim a refund
• By this time it was impossible to enter Standard as we now had 10 carriages worth of people crowded into 4 carriages. Some others were also left behind.
• I went to see the ticket office to enquire about re-routing via London. With split tickets she claimed it was difficult and would need to sell me a new ticket and then I could claim a refund on the existing one. Looking at the times, going via Euston would have got me in at 20:53, only 10 minutes earlier than the 21:03 of waiting for a connection via Birmingham and Banbury. Given the hassle of refunding tickets was likely to take more than the 10 mins saved, I decided not to bother
• I then took the following trains:
  1801 Stafford to Birmingham New Street ar. 1839 [so I could buy food at BHM]
  1901 Birmingham New Street to Reading ar. 2040
  2054 Reading to Wokingham ar. 2103

Had I managed to get on it the 1721 would have got me to Wokingham as expected.

Given the train was not delayed but I was (the advertised first class was not available for the majority of the journey and I could not get on it in Standard) could you please advise me what I should be claiming for? I suspect the delay repay online system would tell me that the trains ran and there was no delay, if so, where should I direct the claim please?

Thanks in advance for all help.