Railways: Coronavirus

(asked on 22nd April 2020) - View Source

Question to the Department for Transport:

To ask Her Majesty's Government what plans they have, if any, to (1) standardise the (a) procedures, and (b) terms and conditions, for rail ticket refunds across the UK, and (2) simplify the pricing of rail fares and the ticketing system, during the time that rail franchises have been transferred onto Emergency Measures Agreements.


Answered by
Baroness Vere of Norbiton Portrait
Baroness Vere of Norbiton
Parliamentary Secretary (HM Treasury)
This question was answered on 6th May 2020

The Department has worked with the rail industry to introduce temporary policy changes to standardise procedures and terms and conditions on ticket refunds across all the Department’s franchised operators. This is in the context of the exceptional circumstances and Government advice to avoid unnecessary travel. For example, we have made Advance tickets held on 23 March refundable with no administration fee and have implemented processes to improve the passenger experience of claiming refunds. These include that passengers can now claim refunds online; they have eight weeks to apply rather than the usual four; and can backdate their season ticket refund to 17 March or when their ticket was last used, whichever is later.

At this time, the Department is focused on protecting the public transport services that key workers rely upon to get to and from work and we have taken decisive action to financially support rail operators to ensure services can continue to operate. No changes to pricing of fares or ticketing systems were implemented as part of the Emergency Measures Agreements.

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