Transport User Voice – Southern rail: have you claimed compensation?

25 April 2017

Have you been affected by the Southern strikes? If you haven’t claimed compensation you have just days to do so.

The one-off scheme, announced last December for Southern’s passengers, is set to close on Sunday 30 April.

Thousands of Southern passengers have suffered significant disruption to their service due strikes, engineering works and poor performance. Southern’s owners Govia Thameslink Railway, announced a Season Ticket Compensation Scheme for ticket holders who can prove 12 weeks’ worth of travel between April and December 2016.

Transport Focus is working with Southern to measure the success in alerting passengers to their entitlement and effectiveness of the train company’s engagement. Through our Transport User Panel, we gained an understanding on how well Southern placed passengers at the heart of the process and the ease of claiming compensation.

Seven in ten passengers of the 200 surveyed passengers knew they were entitled to compensation, with over half of these users knowing a lot about the scheme. The most popular source of information about the compensation scheme has been via the local and national media, with nearly half learning about it this way.

Around a third heard from the company’s website and a direct email which ranked significantly higher than station or train announcements. Three quarters of those surveyed who already made a claim for enhanced compensation have stated the process was easy, describing their experiences as ‘straight forward’ and ‘quick and simple’.

The process has been less than easy for some passengers as our research showed that two in ten found the experience claiming compensation difficult. Some of these people held weekly ticket and were having difficulty providing 12 weeks of travel as per the compensation rules.

Overall, the panel’s snap-shot is good news for many passengers who have acted upon the information they have received. The onus is now on Southern to encourage affected passengers in the coming days to claim the compensation they are entitled to before the 30 April deadline.

Information on the scheme and how you can claim is available here.

Back to newsletter