BEWARE booking on thetrainline.com
 

I recently booked a train ticket on thetrainline.com for the UK and made a mistake on the address. I immediately realized this before I even got offline but had pushed the purchase button. Not to worry I thought as the website clearly says to call a customer service number in the UK to alter or cancel bookings. I hated having to spend the money on a call but figured I had to call to straighten it out. I called and nicely explained asking to change the mailing address or cancel and rebook correctly. Well, to my surprise they could not do anything. The only suggestion was that I buy another ticket. I could wait and see if the ticket is returned to them, which they doubt and waiT for my credit card billing, then take it up with my credit card company or send them the ticket (which I will never receive) and a copy of my credit card statement and I could be issued a refund minus 5gbp. I told them that I had just made the reservation and it could not have been mailed. To make a long story short I made another call and emailed three times to no avail. The only way you can alter reservation or cancel it is AFTER YOU RECEIVE THE TICKET WHICH IS NO HELP IF THE ADDRESS IS WRONG. Luckily for me this was not a big amount of money as I doubt I will ever recover it. For an internet reservations agency to have no recourse except to say too bad just buy another ticket is ridiculous. They kept saying it was not their mistake so they were not responsible. I learned a big lesson to check and check again when booking online for typos and NOT TO DO BUSINESS WITH THETRAINLINE.COM

ggrant:<BR>I booked with the trainline.com and had a different experience. I arranged for my tickets to be delivered to my London hotel. They were there when I arrived and the seats I selected were reserved for us both from London to Edinburgh and return. Everything went as ordered. <BR>I would not hesitate to do future business with them.

Correction - Do not do business with thetrainline.com IF you are too dumb to know your address.

Aw, come on Tom. Don't be so hard on someone's making a human mistake. Or are you perfect?<BR>I appreciate ggrant's warning myself.<BR>(I have been known to make mistakes too.)

My point was ggrant made the mistake, not thetrainline. It is a function of many online agencies that the "reservation server" is automatic and sends out tickets when the transaction is finished. That is why they say to review your info carefully before submitting it. <BR><BR>So it is too bad, and I am sure his cc company will be able to straighten it out. But he made the mistake so he definitely sould not blame thetrainline.

Tom,<BR>You have misspelled 'should' as 'sould'.<BR>The damage is done and you now come across as an illiterate boob, but maybe your ISP can correct that.

ggrant:<BR>To make such a stir about "...not a big amount of money" is curious. Especially since you made 2 calls and sent 3 emails. Why not write to the address that you gave the trainline and request that the ticket be sent to you.

ggrant:<BR>You sound like a gguy/ggirl with a chip on your shoulder.

Grant, I understand what you are saying and I agree that it is a problem for you. Unlike a couple of the other posters here, I have actually made mistakes myself. I wish I were like them and unable to ever make a mistake, but that isn't the case. It is a major problem not to be able to correct something if you accidentally hit enter before you have checked things or completed your address (yes, I've done that also) and judging by the number of people here who do a second post indicating that they hit enter before they were finished -- it is not an uncommon human error.<BR>So I guess the moral is -- this is a company that you can deal with in total confidence if you know you are incapable of making a mistake, but be aware that if you do make a mistake it could cost you money as there is no capable customer service to help you out.

GAWD, there is a HUGE difference between hitting post too early on fodor's, and sending the WRONG ADDRESS for rail tickets. Do you need someone to hold your hand all the time? Maybe you'll give the cab driver a wrong address and you'll be lost in a strange city and never be heard from again.

The main reason I posted this is because their website says to call the customer service line to alter or cancel reservations but when you call they cannot do it. Your only recourse is to buy another ticket and then send the other one in for a refund. To me that is a very big difference and I wanted people to be aware. I had acutally used the trainline to book tickets three or four times in the past.<BR>I knew I would get a lot of nasty replies but I thought others like me could misinterpret the alter or cancel informarion on the website.

Ok, let me explain one way that you can enter a wrong address. Many of those sites have lists of states or countries that you scroll down and click the appropriate one. I'm not great with those and often when I click on my state, the one above it or below it appears, apparently because I made a slight movement as I clicked. If you would then enter the total information without going back and actually proofreading all of it, the address will be wrong. I have caught myself entered information that is wrong -- like clicking June and when I look up May appeared. Yea, of course, I know you always need to proofread everything, but I seriously doubt that I'm the only one in the world who has sometimes failed to do so.<BR><BR>Can't we cut ggrant a little slack here? We don't need a lot of insults about how stupid he his. If you don't accept his warning that in case of error it is virtually impossible to correct a ticket sale with this company, then skip over the post. End of problem. I'm really envious of people who are too careful to ever make mistakes. I wish I could be one of them, but unfortuanately I'm not. Apparently ggrant isn't either.