Pandemic causes big reduction in rail complaints…

A substantial reduction in train services and the number of passengers on the network, as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, caused the number of complaints about the railways to fall from almost 110,000 in the first quarter of 2019-20 to 40,659 in the first quarter of 2020-21.

The Office of Rail and Road’s latest statistics show that 84.6% of complaints were closed within 20 working days, with 18 of 23 train operators meeting industry requirements to close 95% or more of their complaints within that period.

Only Hull Trains (92%), Great Western Railway (85%), West Midlands Trains (83%), c2c (68%) and South Western Railway (28%) failed to meet this target.

Passenger watchdogs closed

212 appeals in the quarter.

Ticketing and refunds policy was the most common reason for complaint, rising by 17 percentage points to 24%, followed by punctuality and reliability (down 2.4pp to 15%), other ticket buying facilities including online sales (up 4.3pp to 11%), rejected delay compensation claims (up 3.4pp to 6%) ,and complaints not being fully addressed or fulfilled (up 1.8pp to 3%).

The most complained about operator was Avanti West Coast, with 7,898 complaints, followed by Great Western Railway (6,352) and South Western Railway (5,764). Hull Trains (13), Heathrow Express (24) and Caledonian Sleeper (36) were the least complained about operators.