Virgin Trains > Reviews > Business Brains don't Take Virgin Trains

Author's product rating:   

Frequency of trains	Satisfactory
Reliability of trains	Occasionally on time
Comfort of trains	Comfortable
On-board facilities	Good

Advantages:	Fairly Cheap
Disadvantages:	Slow, Unreliable

Recommend to potential buyers:

no

Full review

Being a student in Manchester has meant that getting home is a nightmare without a car. It's a simple choice- either a four to six hour coach journey or catch a train direct to London from Manchester which supposedly takes between two and two and a half hours. Sounds like an easy choice doesn't it?

However, lets look at my experiences. Last October it took me four hours on the train to get home, which included a half hour wait at Milton Keynes because I missed my connection.

Then there's been all the times that I've been home and spent a minimum of three hours on the trains getting to and from Manchester. It has meant that on several occasions I have missed my connection, which means that my parents have to wait longer at the station.

But that's not the best bit. Wait for it- Virgin claims to pride itself on customer service. So how do they explain taking 6 weeks to reply to a letter of complaint. The reply was merely stating that my letter had been received and a full reply would follow shortly- I'm still waiting!

I've phoned Virgin and asked them what was taking so long and they claimed they've sent me a reply. I requested a duplicate copy several times, but to no avail. I've given up now, but I've had to write off £30, which is quite a lot money for a student.

Then of course there was an incident at the end of Easter. I was returning from my holiday break in London, when our train broke down in Wilmslow. The driver announced the train had broken down but no information was given after that. After continual harassment, we were told that we would have to wait an hour for a replacement train, after we had already waited half an hour! It was ridiculous. By The time we got back, everyone was completely tired. We didn't complain, but from what I've heard, that is a common situation when a train breaks down.

So come on Virgin, pull your socks up!