Great Western Coffee Shop

SWR have recently introduced delay repay. I'm not completely familiar with it. In the past SWT would automatically refund me when I renew my season ticket for days of disruption. Does that still happen with delay repay? Do I now have to claim for every time I'm delayed? I'm writing this after a fourth consecutive day of disruption.

You need to claim for every delayed journey. This can be done online via the SWR website.

Compensation is calculated pro-rata based on the Season Ticket length.


https://www.southwesternrailway.com/contact-and-help/refunds-and-compensation/delay-repay

That 'journey value' is then refunded at either 25%, 50%, or 100% based on the length of delay.

Options are to take the payouts in money (either BACS or to a credit/debit card) or Rail Travel Vouchers. With the latter, you can save them until your next Season Ticket renewal (they are valid for 12 months) and use them as part payment. You can delight the ticket clerk at your local station when you do so. Best go at a quiet time if you have a few dozen!

If your current Season Ticket was purchased before 4th September 2017 you will also be entitled to (SWT's previous) Passenger Charter renewal discount and/or Void Period refunds, if applicable. This is a transitional arrangement following the introduction of Delay Repay when the franchise changed hands.

How do cancellations work with seasons? With day tickets you can get a full refund as AIUI.

...what I am getting at is if you decide not to travel up/out in the morning due to a cancellation are you only going to be compensated for the delay on that leg and receive nothing for the return leg (say the service has got back to normal for the evening peak).

I am sure there was a more succinct way of putting that, but hopefully it makes sense.

I believe that to be correct - if you choose not to travel, how can you expect compensation for the return leg that you never used (because you chose not to travel)

Seasons as mentioned are seen as a series of single journeys, rather than a series of returns. Although everyone thinks they'll be better off on Delay/repay, this is one instance where they might not be (unless both in & return are both delayed, of course)

I suppose also, where the service is sufficiently frequent (though I cannot think of an example of the top of my head) a single cancellation may not be enough to trigger the delay repay threshold

Edit: I almost did a grahame-esque typo of delay replay, a replay is not what people want!  :D

What happens if a season ticket holder is making a journey only as far as an intermediate station, rather than using the full end to end validity on the ticket, and encounters a delay or cancellation?

Presumably there is no compensation at all? Or is the compensation paid as if the full route was being taken?

I frequently make journeys like this so I am very interested to hear the answer to this.

You make the claim online by entering your start and end stations. You also supply ticket details.

It's up to the TOC to then work of the compensation due.

Compensation is calculated based on the ticket purchased. A walk up ticket holder could also face the same issue, if their ticket allows them to alight before the printed destination.

I see no reason why someone in this situation should be prevented from claiming for a delayed journey.

One important element of the delay repay system is the ability to make a claim for the overall delay caused by a missed connection.

It seems SWR have a novel solution to reducing claims made on this basis - they have removed the journeys involving the tighter connections from the inbuilt journey details selector on the online delay repay form - despite them continuing to be advertised as valid journeys on the national rail route planner.....

I'm interested to see how SWR handle my claim which includes a delay on a gWr train. As its on an Annual Season I too wouldn't receive a discount at renewal but I can't claim from gWr as they don't currently have the option it seems so potentially I'll be caught between the two systems and entitled to no recompense for the additional journey time.
I've submitted my January claims so wonder what will come through the post when they get round to considering all the various disruptions.