Hotel stays on the cards for railway strike passengers
A STRIKE-HIT train operator could pay the hotel costs of commuters left stranded by the longest ever walkout by rail staff, South Western Railway has confirmed.
The company said it would look at compensation claims “individually” after passengers queried if they could claim for hotel stays incurred because train services were finishing earlier during the strike.
It comes as South Western Railway (SWR) has had to cancel more than 850 services over 27 days as the members of the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT) yesterday launched the longest strike action against a major rail operator in living memory.
As the strike got under way, SWR’S social media channels were inundated with angry passengers asking whether they are eligible for refunds.
One, Paul Hugh, asked on Twitter whether he could claim for overnight hotel stays he had been forced to book. He said: “I have to work beyond your last train times and therefore cannot get home, hence my hotel stays.”
Following the request, a spokesman for SWR told The Daily Telegraph: “Anyone who wants to make a consequential claim should contact our customer service centre. Each submission is reviewed individually.”
SWR is operating a revised timetable during the strikes, with last services leaving at the earlier time of 11pm throughout. Passengers have also been warned that only around half of services will run, including those to and from London Waterloo, the country’s busiest railway station.
Under the Consumer Rights Act, passengers have rights to claim for financial losses suffered when a train company fails to deliver a service with “reasonable care and skill”.
Examples of these “consequential losses” include: ordering a taxi due to a train being cancelled or not stopping at your station; overtime paid to a childminder; missing a flight or booking a hotel because a train was delayed or cancelled.
Which?, the consumer watchdog, said to claim for a consequential loss passengers had to prove that the service failure was the fault of the train operator and tantamount to a breach of contract. Passengers also had to show the costs were “reasonably incurred”.
Other passengers were also asking on social media whether they would be eligible for refunds on their season tickets during the strike. During previous walkouts, such as on Northern Rail, passengers were able to claim back a day’s worth of fares if they did not travel due to strike action.
The strikes began yesterday after talks between the RMT and SWR broke down last week over whether human guards should operate the opening and closing of train doors.
Commuting into and out of London can be a wretched enough daily experience without the trains being cancelled, delayed or crowded because of strike action by drivers. The month-long stoppage on South Western Railways by the RMT union is an imposition too far on passengers, many of whom already pay through the nose for the privilege of standing all the way into the capital.
The scenes yesterday with carriages crammed to bursting point were unacceptable. The idea that this state of affairs will continue until Christmas and beyond is outrageous. If the union wishes to make a point about the role of guards on services, it can do so with a 24-hour walkout. But this action is designed to cause maximum harm to SWR and to key sectors of London’s economy, the powerhouse of the nation.
This is likely to be even more pronounced in the run up to Christmas where many businesses rely on festive footfall. As the London Chamber of Commerce and Industry said, it is a cynical move deliberately designed to cause maximum inconvenience to the travelling public at a time when many families will be eager to come to the capital.
Predictably, Labour has backed the strikers and accused SWR of reneging on a deal previously agreed with the union and then withdrawn. The party’s policy for the election is to take the railways back into public ownership, slash fares and give all children under 16 free travel. This attempt to bribe voters with their own money would wreck the system by starving it of investment. If Labour really wants to help passengers, it should tell its friends in the RMT to back off.