Free money from FGW

My diary informs me that it is now 100 days since First Great Western failed to provide a bus replacement service, and left me beside the side of the road in the middle of the night, forcing me to spend £12.00 on a taxi to get home.
Since then I have written three letters of complaint, and received two rail travel vouchers and a free standard-class return trip to the location of my choice.
What I have still not received, sadly, is the £12.00 which was the subject of my original request.
I'm wondering what comes now, as I pen my fourth complaint letter this week. The apologies have become more and more grovelling, the offers of free travel more and more generous, but still no cheque arrives, so what next? Well, my fingers are crossed for a first-class upgrade, as I am thoroughly enjoying my free three-month off-peak upgrade, (see previous post to find out how to get yours, if you haven't already) but I fear that may be beyond the power of even the most senior complaints manager.
Still, it can't hurt to ask. I'll let you know how I get on.
On another note, it seems more and more people are jumping to the defence of FGW, and setting up blogs to answer our questions and explain the problems behind the delays. This is great, and the sort of thing that the FGW management has been too short-sighted to provide so far. So, please visit In Defence of First Great Western and see if you can get your questions answered.

Great big gigantic signal failure

Well, last night's trip home was a bundle of fun I can tell you.
Due to what I eventually found out was a great big gigantic signal failure (that is the technical term), we were all turfed off our late night train at Slough, and treated to a double decker bus ride through Maidenhead and Twyford, before being deposited at Reading. Through a stroke of luck, my car happened to be at a friend's house in Reading, otherwise I shudder to think how I would have got home to Pangbourne, where another dreaded rail replacement bus is also in place from Tilehurst because of work on the line. I still didn't make it home until after 1am, but at least it didn't cost me anything.
So, this leads me to another question - why do signals fail so frequently, and why can't they be fixed or replaced so that they don't fail so often?
Signal failure is one of the most common reasons why trains are delayed, so I feel I should try and learn a bit more about it. I realise that the signals are not part of FGW's remit, but I don't care about that, I just want to know why the system doesn't work, and how to fix it.
This is all I know so far from a brief foray on the internet: signals can fail for a variety of reasons (what reasons?) and when they do, they always "fail safe", which means they go to red for safety reasons. That's about it. I can't find anything more helpful, apart from very technical descriptions of type of signal and signal procedures, which I can't bring myself to read.
So, rail fans, what's the answer? Whose fault is it and why isn't it being sorted?

Not sure whether to laugh or cry

Poor First Great Western. Sometimes I feel almost sorry for them. As regular visitors will know, I've been trying for some time to get a refund of £12.00 for a taxi I had to take when a replacement bus service failed to turn up. Since then, I've been exchanging letters with the Customer Service Department, who eventually agreed to give me a refund. However, a month later, I'd still not received a cheque, so I sent a third letter, chasing up the payment. These are selected highlights from the letter I received yesterday:

"I regret there has been an administrative error, and the ordering of your cheque has been severely delayed. However, I have arranged for another cheque to be sent to you at the earliest available opportunity"

"As a goodwill gesture ... I would like to offer you a complimentary Standard Class ticket to make a return journey with First Great Western at any time in the next twelve months"

"I am happy to enclose a Rail Travel Voucher for £5.00"

"I would like to thank you for your letter and your patience in this matter and hope that this will be resolved to your satisfaction soon"

Honestly, all I want is my £12.00 back, but FGW seem utterly unable to send it to me. So, instead, they've so far given me £30.00 in rail vouchers and a free return ticket, valid for 12 months. Which must be worth a few pounds as it's a standard return, which as we know is almost as expensive per mile as a charter rocket flight to Mars.

It almost makes me feel guilty, as though I'm kicking a puppy, when they're so grovellingly sorry for not being able to give me what I want.

But then, I think back to my journey this morning, in which my train from Pangbourne was delayed, and I only made my connection at Reading by sprinting full tilt across the entire station in a most undignified fashion, even though I'd allowed plenty of time for delays.

And, I read articles like this one in the Times, and it turns out I don't feel so bad after all.

28 days later

There are a lot of things you can buy with £12.00. For example, a quick glance at Amazon informs me I could buy the film The Train (with Burt Lancaster, 1964) on DVD, a copy of the Bob Dylan CD Slow Train Coming, or even the book Strangers on a Train by Patricia Highsmith. I could buy any one of these and still have enough change from my £12.00 to buy sweets in the shape of trains (can you get sweets in the shape of trains?) if that is what I chose to do with my £12.00.

But, sadly, this option is not open to me, because I have still not received my compensation cheque from FGW for a journey I took on the 28th of April. It is now, if I have counted correctly, 59 days since I spent the money on a taxi after being abandoned beside the road late at night. It is also, more importantly, more than 28 days since I was informed that a cheque would be forthcoming. And I quote, from a letter dated the 24th of May:

"I have arranged for a cheque to the value of £12.00 to be sent to you from our Finance Department. This will be sent directly from them, under separate cover, at the earliest available opportunity, please allow up to 28 days for delivery". Well, the 28 day period has passed, and the cheque has not arrived. So, complaint letter number 3 is on its way to the customer service department, which, by the way is a freepost address (First Great Western Customer Services Team, FREEPOST SWB40576, Plymouth, PL4 6ZZ).

I should have warned them, I get very upset from the lack of sugar which results from eating no sweets in the shape of trains (there must be sweets in the shape of trains, surely? Imagine the pleasure in being able to bite them in half, a bit like jelly babies), and when I get upset, I write letters. Lots and lots of letters. I think you should too.

Tick Tock

It's been nearly three weeks now since I received a letter telling me that I would be sent a refund from the First Great Western finance department, for a journey I took back in April during which my friend and I were abandoned at the side of the road after midnight, when a replacement bus failed to materialise.

It's not a large amount of money - the taxi home only cost £12.00, when we finally managed to flag one down - but it's the principle of the thing. And the fact that the company tried to brush off my claim for a refund with a standard letter spouting a passage from the infamous CoC (Conditions of Carriage).

It's just not good enough to treat people like this, forcing them to write two letters of complaint before anything is done. It's one of so many reasons that I hate FGW, this complete disregard for people's anger and frustration. It's not like I was expecting compensation, just a refund for a journey I was forced to take when their service failed.

One of the blog's visitors, a rail employee, says he's heard through the grapevine that all complaints are now being sent to the ombudsman, to make sure the system is being improved. So once again, I urge you to complain in writing every time you feel that anger at being treated badly, at being squashed into a full carriage, at being delayed and late for work, or, like me, finding yourself standing by the side of the road in the dark.

I'll wait another week for this money, but then I shall be putting another complaint in the post. And this time I will be asking for compensation. And interest at the standard rate. Tick tock, tick tock...

Calling all Bath haters, and I don't mean soap dodgers

I am happy to announce that the second batch of badges have now arrived, the last lot having been sent far and wide across the FGW network. And, I'm specially pleased that the nice people at More Train Less Strain have ordered 100, to distribute to unhappy passengers in the Bath area.
So, if you're unhappy and in the Bath area, see if you can see anyone wearing an "I Hate First Great Western" badge and they might be able to give you one of these highly fashionable accessories of your very own.
Of course, if you're not in Bath, you can always use the traditional method of e-mailing me at IhateFGW@yahoo.co.uk and giving me your address so I can send you one, or perhaps several.
It seems that FGW are having to seek far and wide to find a bus company willing to pick people up at the weekends for their replacement services. On Saturday night, the driver of the bus replacement from Tilehurst to Pangbourne had to use his sat-nav to find the way. It's 3.1 miles. Still, I shouldn't complain, it arrived and we got home, so compared to recent journeys, it was a positive triumph. The new timetable came into force today, did anyone spot the difference?

Waiting for a replacement bus service

Ah, there's nothing like a trip to the theatre on a Saturday night. The performance was excellent, and all was going well, until my friend and I tried to get home. At Paddington station, chaos ruled. The 2330 fast train to Reading was being replaced by a much slower bus, due to engineering works. So, we and several million other people squeezed onto the 2320 slow service, stopping at all stations (and there are a lot of them) to Oxford.
Except one.
Pangbourne.
Pangbourne station is unfortunate enough not to have an extra platform, so when there are engineering works, the train doesn't stop there. Instead, a replacement bus is meant to pick passengers up at Tilehurst.
But, due to the lateness of the train, caused by the chaos at Paddington, we arrived at Tilehurst 20 minutes late. And so, when we got off the train at Tilehurst, there was no bus to be seen. No replacement bus service whatsoever. And, of course, no taxi rank at a station of that size. So, through no fault of our own, there we were, two females, at half past midnight, sober, tired, on the side of the road, with no way of getting home. Not really acceptable at all. So, cue one strongly worded letter of complaint, with a claim for compensation for the £12 it cost us to (eventually) get home by taxi. Let's see if they can manage this without ****ing it up completely, like they do with everything else. Hell hath no fury like a blogger scorned. Let's just say, for their well-being, I hope they're clever enough to deal with the complaint quickly, and that the word "sorry" makes it into the response somewhere.
Anyway, how was your weekend? I look forward to receiving some photos of you wearing your badges, and any comments you've received so far.