National Express Coaches Cancelled - Refunds??

x-Princess-Vikki-x

Hi,

I travelled from Milton Keynes - London Marble Arch on Wednesday morning, due to return on the coach at 17.05.

However this coach never turned up, called National Express and they booked me on one at 18.10. However, this coach and the 17.45 one never turned up either.

So I rang them again.. "Sorry all the coaches have broken down, I can get you a ticket for tomorrow" Obviously a ticket home for the next day would be no use as I cannot afford to just stay in a hotel in central london on short notice! So they said I could get the train home and then they will reimburse me.

My question is, how much should I be reimbursed??
Obviously the train fare, but should I get the tube ticket cost aswell? As I had to go from Marble Arch - Euston on the tube to catch the train.
And also get the taxi from MK train station back to the coach station to get to my car. Should this also be reimbursed??

And the actual coach fare I paid? And the very expensive phone call from my mobile to contact them, when according to their T&C's, they should have rang me? Any compensation??

Thanks all

OlliesDad

I would say that you are entitled to all the costs you had to pay out for due to their breach of contract. That would be:

Train Fare
Tube Fare
Taxi Fare
Phone Calls

I would say no to the coach fare as by paying the above they got you to your destination (you get nothing for free unfortunately).

DebtHater

Believe it or not, National Express actually have accounts with taxi companies all around the country. They will use the taxis should they not deliver a good service to you, or for whatever reason you find your self stranded (if its their fault of course). The taxis are all fixed price and paid for by National Express, and from memory when I did the taxis, it was about £1.50 per mile.
We only ever did the transport when the coach was running late and the customer missed their connection - we never actually had to deal with broken down requests. But I know they have systems in place to deal with problems such as this.

Makes me laugh how they say "oh just jump on the train" - would have been cheaper in the long run for them to supply a taxi rather than refund you train, tube & taxi fares. And it would have been a good resolution for you, the customer.

The taxi requests are dealt with by the customer services team, who should have recommended it as a suitable resolution. They sometimes outsource it to a company in Plymouth called Taxi Bank (who have all the breakdown companies as customers too!) - our taxi firm had a direct account with National Express, but it would be difficult for them to deal with taxi companies all over the country, so they outsource their accounts to Taxi Bank, who deal with the booking and invoice on NE's behalf.

But leaving you in London to make your own way home? Thats appalling.

x-Princess-Vikki-x

Thanks for the advice.

I was the only one waiting at Marble Arch as everyone else seems to get on at Victoria Station.
I was most annoyed because I had to ring them 3 times to find out what was going on, when I feel they should have informed me.
And I dont really think all the coaches could have broken down. I was waiting for one of 3, and none of them turned up. So whatever happened they obviously didnt want to tell me.

Either way the only solution they could come up with is a ticket for the next day (no use) and I was the one that asked whether I could just get the train back and be reimbursed. The guy was like yeah sure do that then.... not much use and didnt come up with any other solutions, nor was he apologetic.

Luckily the train fare was only £10 with my railcard, taxi fare £5 and tube £5. So not a huge loss but I am annoyed at using £7+ phone credit just trying to resolve their problem! But what would someone do if they were short of money or had a more expensive train fare?? They would be stranded!

I have contacted them to claim my reimbursement.

hippey

I suspect they had not broken down but might have gone a different route.... Victoria was a nightmare yesterday for traffic and it was taking the best part of an hour just to get from VCS to Hyde Park Corner due to the traffic!

Or could you have got the bus (Route 73) from Marble Arch to Terminus Place then walked down to VCS? That would have been £2 and there is a NE office at VCS

purplejac

Id go for everything you can get from them they left you in a terrible situation id also ask for compensation for the stress of it all !!!