Mike Wooldridge

@BIforPeace @seatsixtyone Definitely agree with your last point! (Or do night one way and day the other…) But the route has got more popular since the pandemic, so the risk has definitely increased. Saying that, looks like every tourist is now in the same boat so might put some off going…

@mdw1989 @seatsixtyone Idk, a booked a couchette from Bar station in the end of August just a couple of days before in 2019. The refurbished Serbian couchettes are as good as the sleepers, but if you go there for the first time you should do the journey by daytime anyway.

I've reluctantly removed a suggested travel agency for booking the Belgrade-Montenegro train as it was *too successful*. Agency says they were inundated, getting more & more requests, communication with Serbian Railways & co-ordinating ticket purchase & payments getting harder.

@BIforPeace @seatsixtyone It’s mainly the sleeper services - these do get booked up ahead of time, so particularly in summer you are taking a risk leaving it until you arrive in the country.

@seatsixtyone It is easy enough to buy tickets by yourself at the station, but for some reason people think train tickets must be booked months in advance. This has some truth in it for Western Europe and some other parts of the world, but totally unnecessary in the Balkans.

@TLRailUK Hello! One to pass on to your infrastructure team - the 0910 at Bedford needs bank holiday overrides added for the @EastMidRailway peak service messaging!

@seatsixtyone It’s tricky when you need a human locally to deliver the tickets - starting a European rail travel org as a side project and one of my first potential customers I had to turn down as they wanted this route! Railway companies need to catch up…

Sad agencies don't want the business, when there's clearly a gap in the market, and with a suitable fee, could be good money. And it shows that demand for this train is being stifled by a negligent lack of online booking by Serbian & Montenego Railways - it's 2026 not 1986!

@TLRailUK Hello! Can I just check (as there seem to be conflicting updates) trains are running through without stopping? I need to get from Bedford-Blackfriars later and wondering if I'll need to plan to go the long way via Tube from St Pancras.

⚠️ The emergency services are dealing with an incident at Farringdon station. ❌ The station has been closed until further notice and no trains will call here in either direction. ℹ️ More information to follow...

@MichLKosinski @British_Airways Was it an overnight connection? No visa is required if your itinerary was such that you didn't need to clear UK immigration. gov.uk/eta/when-not-n…

Anyone have NO IDEA that you now need a visa even to transit through the UK?? And then @British_Airways marks you a “no show” even as they watch you frantically apply for said visa and miss check-in by 1 minute? And then nullifies your entire multi-city multi-country itinerary?

@JohnTillUK Exciting! Do you know if this will roll out elsewhere too? For example to improve the Birmingham New St departures info that seems to have been broken for months at this point…

Quite excited and also nervous on the work front. Tomorrow sees a software release with some of the biggest changes to our Customer Information System ever - some groundbreaking stuff coming on-stream. Can’t wait

@AvantiWestCoast Thanks Beth. From experience that isn’t going to yield a response by tomorrow’s have advised them to just travel and appeal any additional amount charged. :-) (again, appreciate your help and realise none of this has anything to do with the SM team!)

@mdw1989 I've passed this information on internally but your friend would need to contact our Customer Resolutions team directly. - Beth

@AvantiWestCoast I have a friend looking to travel back from Manchester and they’d replanned arrangements for tomorrow based on your earlier advice. I see ticket acceptance has now been ‘revoked’ on the NRE guidance, what do you suggest they do please?

@AvantiWestCoast Refunds are useless if someone needs to get home sadly! You’ve given that permission on NRE via your Control team, it really should be binding

Thank you for raising this to us. I'll pass this on internally to be looked into as our messaging has been there are alternate routes available for travel today but refunds are available should people wish to abandon their journey. In the meantime if your friend can please email their information to our Customer Resolutions team at: Customer.Resolutions@avantiwestcoast.co.uk they can look into this for them and provide a written response - Beth

@AvantiWestCoast Thanks Beth (and I appreciate none of this is your fault). The NRE page at nationalrail.co.uk/service-disrup… stated earlier this afternoon that tickets would be accepted tomorrow and they planned based on that advice. Now that page specifically says that advice is revoked.

@mdw1989 I'm sorry which advice? We have the ticket acceptance which is still on our thread here:x.com/AvantiWestCoas… which is still in place currently. - Beth

@AvantiWestCoast Thanks Beth - but that’s not what I asked. Based on your earlier advice they replanned to travel tomorrow. It is ludicrous that you can offer this then withdraw it explicitly.

Hi there if they are no longer wishing to travel today they can refund their tickets at point of purchase. If this was with Avanti they can do this here: railhelp.co.uk/avantiwestcoas… If they need further assistance please call our Customer Resolutions team on: 0345 528 0253, options 7 and 5. They are open until 10pm this evening - Beth

Tonight I’m travelling from Switzerland to Hungary whilst I sleep… sadly the free Hungarian fizz in the @seatsixtyone guide is no more but I forgot how much I love sleeper trains, perfect to chill with a good book or switch the lights off and watch the night come alive outside.

@RailService Found it!

@RailService Thank you! Please can you also give me a email to get a refund for my meal that I had to pay for halfway through eating as the train got cancelled.

@RailService Hello! I am on the 20:07 from Basel to Zurich which is delayed due to a technical fault. I have a connection to the 2140 NightJet to Budapest. Is it possible to hold this train in case of significant delay please?

@SimonCalder Oh excellent, I’m on the 11:04 Eurostar. Will report back with what St Pancras is looking like

Port of Dover: outbound traffic snarled up due to French IT issues. Likely to affect Eurotunnel and Eurostar. Are you arriving in or departing from a French airport? Please let me know if you are experiencing problems. Hopefully a short-lived issue.

@EastMidRailway Sure thing! DM sent

@mdw1989 Hi Mike, please can you DM us with some more details. ^JB

@EastMidRailway Appreciate there’s disruption this afternoon but there’s been essentially catering facilities on my journey today in First. Is it possible to get the difference back between a Standard and First ticket?

Essentially no catering even!