South Western Railway paid more than \u00a38m last year in compensation to passengers for delayed or cancelled trains.<\/p>\n
About a third of the operator’s trains did not run on time in 2024-2025, well below its own punctuality target.<\/p>\n
The company became the first failing train operator taken over and brought back into public ownership by the government in May 2025.<\/p>\n
According to the Department for Transport, the operator spent \u00a38.25m on payouts to rail users under its Delay, Repay scheme.<\/p>\n
South Western Railway said reasons for delayed or late running trains included “extreme weather conditions and a number of specific infrastructure and trespass incidents”.<\/p>\n
Under the scheme, passengers can claim compensation if their train is delayed by 15 minutes or more.<\/p>\n
The longer the delay, the greater the amount of compensation, ranging from 25% of a single ticket for a 15 minute delay, to 100% of any ticket for two hours or more.<\/p>\n
The Department for Transport said fewer than half of passengers actually claimed the refunds they were entitled to.<\/p>\n
South Western Railway added: “We know delays and cancellations are frustrating and we are determined to reduce the number of disruptive incidents our customers face.<\/p>\n
“However, when things do go wrong, our teams are also focused on recovering faster to keep services moving.”<\/p>\n
A Department for Transport spokesman said: “While performance this summer was impacted by issues unrelated to public ownership, traincrew-related cancellations were reduced by almost 84% and the number of trains running with fewer carriages than planned fell by around 40%, helping to deliver a more reliable service for passengers.<\/p>\n
“There is more to do, but this progress shows how bringing services into public ownership is benefitting passengers.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Operator was first to be taken into public ownership<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":26,"featured_media":30050,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[47996],"coauthors":[160],"class_list":["post-48628","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-transport","tag-bristol-and-bath","tag-featured-story"],"yoast_head":"\n