Reclaim Expenses for Taxi due to cancelled train journey

Ben3

Hello all, hopefully someone can share some knowledge on this: 

last Sunday (23/6) we were travelling back from Brighton to Weymouth by train, as anyone who was doing similar will know, there was a signaling failure in Southampton which meant no trains could pass through.

Our first train (Southern) therefore terminated at Fareham. 

Knowing we had no other way to get home, we booked a Taxi from Fareham to Brockenhurst - South Western Railway were running again from there. There were no replacement busses or any alternative transport laid on. 

I was under the impression that we would be able to claim our taxi costs back but have since contacted both train companies and they each directed us to the other. Unfortunately the part of journey we skipped was the bit we would have switched form a Southern train to a South Western Railway train, so I guess this gives them each some wiggle room to try and avoid paying out. 

Do you think we should be entitled to the taxi cost reimbursed?
We have made the claim for a ticket refund due to being over an hour late, and this has been approved so there is at least acknowledgement that there were problems.  

p00hsticks

The usual advice in these circumstances is to find a member of staff at the station (not always easy, especially on a Sunday) or contact customer services for the train provider you were meant to be travelling on and ask for advice on how to proceed - they should be able to arrange onward transport for you themselves if necessary, although if the service is expected to resume in time for you to complete your journey that day I think they may ask you just to wait. 

 Train companies have contracts with taxi, coach and hotel companies which means that it costs them a lot less to provide the service than it does the end customer. 

Did you speak to anyone at the station or via phone to customer services at the time ?
Were you aware of any expected time for the signalling problem to be resolved ? 

saajan_12

Re the switching train companies issue, could you apportion the cost, claiming 
Fareham - changeover station from the first train co; and
changeover station - Brockenhurst from the second train co?

You'll still have the issue of whether they expected you to use a cheaper method entirely eg buses, wait for the train, get them to book a taxi at a bulk rate etc. 

Danthenoble

Hi Ben, It is the train you could not use for the final leg of your journey that is the one you need to claim from. Try to keep your request to them simple and refer to the train you were unable to use perhaps do not mention another train company. Here is a link where you can claim from South Western Type: south western railway taxi reimbursement in Google and its right there.

Good luck!

Voyager2002

Ben3 said:

We have made the claim for a ticket refund due to being over an hour late, and this has been approved so there is at least acknowledgement that there were problems.  

I fear that you have shot yourselves in the foot!

You are entitled either to a refund of the ticket price or to transport to enable you to complete your journey, not both. Obviously a refund of the ticket price will be much less, and so I am not surprised that they have agreed to this, meaning that your claim for a refund of the taxi fare fails.

Did you ask for help at the station? Was there any reason why you could not have allowed them to organise a bus or taxi for you?

Ben3

Thanks for the replies, yeah I think our mistake was to just walk out of the station and book a taxi, we didn’t speak to anyone as there were huge queues for the staff member on hand. 

Will try the other methods above but as Voyager says, we may have shot ourselves in the foot by doing the ticket refund, luckily in this case for 2 of us the taxi cost about £10 less than the total ticket cost, so we haven’t actually lost out, but I would have thought you should be able to claim both