A commuter on Greater Anglia’s Ipswich line is suing the train operator over ‘continually’ delayed services.
According to the BBC, Seph Pochin tracked delays between his home in Halesworth, Suffolk and Ipswich between February 2017 and February 2018, with one train delayed by 100 minutes last year. He claims the delays add up to 28 hours a year.
Of 550 journeys, he recorded 183 delays, the majority of which were between one and ten minutes. Pochin claims 26 were more than 15 minutes late.
Although Greater Anglia has a delay-repay scheme, Pochin paid £35 to launch a small claims case against the company under the Consumer Rights Act 2016 “to highlight the regular deficiencies with the service”. He agreed to mediation with the operator, but Greater Anglia failed to present dates for a meeting so Pochin applied for a judgement ruling in which the company was ordered to pay him £350 compensation last December.
In February, Pochin said he still hadn’t received his payment and paid £77 for a warrant to be filed against Greater Anglia to serve the assets.
A Greater Anglia spokeswoman admitted some of the delays recorded by Pochin were “directly attributable” to the operator, according to the BBC, but said the Ipswich line is being upgraded as part of Network Rail’s £68 million scheme “to make the train service more reliable”.
The legislation Pochin used to lodge his case means rail passengers are entitled to the same protections as other goods and services.