thetrainline.com - problems?

dearbarbie

Argh! I booked some tickets for a business meeting tomorrow and it's all gone wrong! There was an error on the final booking screen - it confirmed my booking but there as no fastticket reference...it said 'your fastticket reference is.' and there was no email after. I emailed trainline.com to ask what the deal was (I used a link through quidco.com and the sale has been recorded there because I earned some cashback).

My prob now is with the trainline's customer service. They keep asking me for my name and address, I keep emailing it back, it's all in a massive email with a huge history and they keep asking the same questions!!! Can't they read? I don't mean to sound bad but I don't think they can understand English, it's really weird - do they outsource their customer service to another country?

I'd ring up but worried I'll have the same problem there - especially when I explain quidco.com and that the sale for £40 has been recorded on there!!
Anyone had any problems with them? I just said on the last email that I'm going to end up making a second complaint (and I hate complaining) at this rate about their inability to read an email's history and not ask the same questions (there's about 8 emails, but only 2 of their staff have been involved with the responses)...

blindman

Ring them

01925 671729 (from saynoto0870)

Had a similar problem a couple of months ago. My sale never showed up on their system.

Their office is in Edinburgh. Helpful people.

Voyager2002

And never use trainline again. Sure, you get 1 per cent on Quidco, but that is canceled out by the credit card fee. Use a cashback card and you can easily get 1 per cent, and then buy from one of the train operating companies -- no credit card fee and far better service.

blindman

Voyager2002 wrote: »

And never use trainline again. Sure, you get 1 per cent on Quidco, but that is canceled out by the credit card fee. Use a cashback card and you can easily get 1 per cent, and then buy from one of the train operating companies -- no credit card fee and far better service.

Actually if you use First Capital Connect web site it uses the same booking engine, but doesn't charge any CC fees :rolleyes:

And as for the 1% saving via Quidco-IMHO unless your ticket is in the £100's it's not worth it.

GlennTheBaker

I've used Midland Mainline and Virgin Trains websites to book tickets and they both appear to use the same booking engine as The Trainline too - again, without the credit card fee.

stillill_2

Here's another user who won't use TheTrainline.com again. I assumed (wrongly) because they use the same booking engine as Virgin and (I think) GNER, that they were effectively the same.

But you don't get a fraction of the tickets offered by VirginTrains.co.uk on TheTrainline.com - they don't show a lot of the single fares that you could get, but instead make it look like you have to buy a weekend saver or something like that (at more expense).

Plus you don't get the option to book your seats in Quiet Carriage etc., AND there's the CC fee.

Feel like such a diddy, I've used Thetrainline.com for ages, thinking it was just the booking engine rather than a third-party rip-off machine. Avoid.

Here's me trying to get from Euston to Glasgow:

vicclub

On arriving at the station I found out the train was cancelled so did not even retrieve my booked tickets from the station machine. This was in December last year and I have just got a refund. It took dozens of emails of which copies were sent to the refund office in Edinburgh.
>The TrainLine
> Refunds Department
> PO Box 23072
> Edinburgh
> EH2 9AF
In their emails The TrainLine kept on promising the refund and apologising and asking me to wait just a few more days. I have now received the refund. They have had my money for five months due to no fault of mine. They just hope by keeping you waiting you will go away and give up. Either way they win because even if they pay your refund they have had your money in their account, earning interest, by keeping you waiting.
Use someone else for your tickets.

Angusd

It appears that this organisation is a complete rip-off as well as being a total shambles.

Even if you do manage to use them successfully our research, conducted subsequent to use it, indicates that tickets which are purchased in the conventional manner from machines and/or ticket offices are substantially cheaper in many cases than those on offer from 'the trainline.com'.

As can be seen from the thread above in the event of one needing to get a refund for any reason this is likely to prove nigh on impossible. I reproduce below an e-mail which I sent to the company to which I have not yet had even the courtesy of a response. I think the content should be fairly self-explanatory.

Whilst I was attempting to book one of these tickets online earlier on your website crashed and I logged back in and tried again. This time I was successful and the website told me that I could collect my ticket from Oxshott Station. When I went to do so by I found the machine at Oxshott was defective and would not allow me to collect any tickets.
As the purpose of the ticket was to transport a workman to London in the morning I ended up buying him a ticket, without any problem, directly from the machine in the normal way.
When I got home I obviously sought to get a refund on the wasted ticket that wouldn't even come out of the machine Oxshott. During the course of this process it became clear that your website had caused me to be charged twice for exactly the same ticket within a few minutes of each other, the website having failed first time round. I was also disappointed to discover that the refund mechanism keeps at least £10 of each leg. So here we have two tickets, both returns, the total value of each ticket, including the booking fee, is £15.80. The machine wants to charge me £20 cancellation charge for each £15.80 ticket although one is a duplication error caused by your website and the other one is unreasonable because I cannot extract it from the machine at Oxshott.
This tells me that there are some significant hidden disadvantages to anyone even contemplating using your booking system.
To add insult to injury when I purchased the tickets directly from the machine in the normal way (after it steadfastly refused to give me the one that you had charged me for twice) the normal purchase system charged me £11.20 for a ticket for which your system charged £15.80!
I therefore require that you refund £31.60 to my card forthwith. I am not interested in any 21 day period and possibly five days thereafter for it to be 'processed'. If this money is not refunded in full to my credit card within seven days I shall issue proceedings against your company in the Small Claims Court with attendant costs and no further discussion.
I note that you have managed to acquire a link from the moneysaving expert website however I will make sure that they are aware of this situation before other people fall into the trap of either finding out that tickets that they have bought and paid for can not be refunded without the penalties being excessive. I will also make sure that everyone is aware of the potential technical difficulties with your website which we have encountered today.
The icing on the cake is apparently that the very helpful 'helpline' which, in our experience today, was unhelpful, slow and inefficient racks up customers' phone bills with extortionate charges!

I would strongly advise anybody to keep away from the company.

Tia_Maria06

I have been using trainline, and have found it no cheaper to be honest. I also filled out some survey of some sort and they promised me a £15 cheque as a cashback, that still hasnt arrived. Tut

Ponkle22

Can I stick my head above the parapet and say I booked tickets in advance for a long journey with trainline and I got it loads cheaper than anywhere else, plus I paid an extra £5.00 to go first class all the way. I did price compare before I booked.

I was delighted with my purchase, but have only used this service the once.

dzug1

Ponkle22 wrote: »

Can I stick my head above the parapet and say I booked tickets in advance for a long journey with trainline and I got it loads cheaper than anywhere else, plus I paid an extra £5.00 to go first class all the way. I did price compare before I booked.

I was delighted with my purchase, but have only used this service the once.

Well yes you can - but that ticket should have been available elsewhere at the same price and with no booking fee. So something went wrong with your price compare.