The Great British rail replacement rip off: passengers to pay £90 for bus journeys

The Great British rail replacement rip off: passengers to pay £90 for bus journeys



Posted by theipaper

7 comments

  1. Passengers are set to pay as much as £90 for rail replacement bus tickets this Christmas as more cancellations are set to hit the British rail network.

    While customers are entitled to rail fare compensation for services running behind schedule or those which are cancelled, the cost of travelling on a rail replacement bus is the same as a functioning train service, as both require a valid rail ticket.

    However, anyone travelling from Liverpool to London on Friday 27 December will face a 50-mile bus trip between Liverpool and Stoke due to reduced services and delays of over an hour.

    Most of the available journeys on that day will involve a bus replacement service from Liverpool Lime Street to Stoke-on-Trent and then a train into Euston.

    Despite the additional hour to an already 3 hour 16 minute journey, passengers will face a return ticket price of £90.30.

    The journey between London and Norwich will require three changes next Friday, with a rail replacement bus through Essex. Passengers on the trip must pay £83.40 for a return.

    Meanwhile, those travelling between Bedford and London will have to pay £40 for a return but will face most of the journey off the tracks and on a bus to Milton Keynes.

    It comes as some of the UK’s largest rail companies face sustained criticism for poor performance this year, with Avanti, Northern and CrossCountry all criticised by the Government for “unacceptable” delays and cancellations.

    Rail fares will rise by 4.6 per cent next year despite this poor performance, and rail bosses continue to see their bonuses increase.

    Almost 800 rail services have been cancelled every day in 2024, *The i Paper* revealed.

    Over the year, ten per cent of CrossCountry’s trains have been delayed each day, and more than 200 trains a day on Northern have been scrapped.

    The travel chaos is likely to get worse over the Christmas period, with Britain’s 10 worst rail firms already announcing changes to services. London NorthWestern Railway has urged passengers to avoid travelling over the holidays altogether.

    Meanwhile, Great Western Railway has asked passengers not to bring “massive suitcases” onboard due to reduced services.

  2. When you can get a Megabus or a flixibus across the country for 15£ then you should really be refunded for the entirety of the train ticket. Better yet, make it a legal mandate that cancelled trains require private taxis, see how fast this shit stops.

  3. can’t remember if anyone has ever checked my ticket on a rail replacement service. I don’t think they ever have.
    So technically its free unless you’re a season ticket holder.

  4. Who do I vote for to get the trains running on time?

  7. Boss’s bonuses are setting this country back fifty years.

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