What silly people they have in their email response department. I'll explain.
Timetable in hand, I decide to check out the cost for me, girly and baby to go to London for the Summer Sling Show and a bit of a jolly. As it is reasonably affordable with a railcard I decided to book a cheap room for us so we can spend a little free time there on Monday too. But yesterday I attempt to actually book pay for the train and the 0844 from Manchester to Euston has vanished! In fact all the direct trains for the whole weekend have gone! More annoyingly, there are no service disruption announcements on any of the train websites. I hear on the grapevine talk of strikes. So I emailed asking sbout the missing services. 5 emails later (asking me to clarify this and that, one nugget of information at a time) I receive this fantastic reply:
| Thank you for writing back to us. I am sorry to know that the available train service is not up to your satisfaction. However, the train service at 0844 is not available due to some reasons. No direct train is available for your journey. The train which does not passes through Sheffield departs Manchester Piccadilly at 0953 and will arrive London Euston at 1436 hours. If you wish to reach London Euston before 1200 PM and do not wish to go via Sheffield, you may board the train at 2100 hours on 26th June, 2008. However, this route is not convenient for you with two children as it covers foot and tube journey also. For further details about 0844 train service, please contact the customer relations team of CrossCountry at 0870 010 0084, as the day to day operations related to trains and station are handled by Train Operating company. If you have any further queries, please do not hesitate in contacting us. Kind regards, Ruth | |
| Customer | 22/07/2008 07:27 PM |
| Why is there no direct train? As I previously mentioned due to my deaf child and small baby I cannot transfer trains. The sheffield train is too slow and would make us late for the event we are booked to attend. I will now have to cancel my holiday. Will Virgin pay me my out of pocket expenses for my non-refundable hotel booking and my event ticket? I am not happy! What is the reason the service isn't running as per the timetable? | |
| Response | |
So they suggest I travel overnight and hang out at train stations until dawn? Well at least the time will pass quickly as there are three changes on that route. Genius.
You know, if from the beginning they had just said, Really sorry but there is a strike on, it's out of our control, that would have been acceptable. But the rubbish they are coming out with is frustrating beyond belief!
Looks like I will have to hitchhike if I am still going to go, else get the bus. Sigh.
2 comments:
That is absolute nuts - if I have managed to decipher their incredibly bad english correctly!
Hope you manage to get there somehow :-$
Thanks, we are going by coach now, coming back on the train (despite my very strong urge to boycott the useless beggars). Oh well, have boobs- will travel!
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