In October Virgin Trains became the first operator to offer automatic delay repay (ADR) to passengers. The system calculates the money due to a customer in the event of a delay and automatically pays the compensation directly onto the card they used for purchase. The compensation is calculated under the existing Delay Repay scheme.

ADR is available to Virgin Trains customers travelling on the West Coast Mainline who purchased their Advance tickets through www.virgintrains.com or the mobile app. Around 3.5 million customer journeys could benefit from the scheme.

Many additional passengers could also benefit simply by purchasing their Advance tickets through the website, which guarantees the cheapest fares with no booking fees.

We expect this new system to result in an additional £2.8 million being paid to passengers in compensation within the next year, on top of the existing level of compensation. This is because many people simply do not claim at the moment, and is based on current website use and levels of previous delays.

Phil Whittingham, Managing Director, Virgin Trains on the West Coast said, “We’re proud of our record of customer service at Virgin Trains and are always looking for new ways to innovate for the benefit of customers. So we’re delighted to be the first train company to automatically refund cash directly back onto customers’ payment cards should they be delayed by more than 30 minutes. This will be available to customers who book through our website or app, so the more people who book with us, the more we can help in this way. This is just one of a range of innovations we have planned for the coming year, all of which are aimed squarely at the most important person – the customer.”