Westcoastrailways Reviews

Avoid at all costs

Avoid West Coat Rail at all costs In February we booked for a trip in August 5 weeks before hand they cancelled our trip because of planning restrictions This didn t make sense so I did a bit more research and found that The initial legislation on Slam Door stock was announce in 1999 Doors on vintage trains required locks that would stop people opening the doors and keep people safe Central Door Locking or CDL They ve had over 20 years to come up with a schedule for doing the work The cost of fitting CDL would have been about 10 of their profit for 1 year Roughly 15 per passenger WCR kept getting exemptions from The Office of Road and Rail ORR On the 1st of December 2023 they were given a final 3 month extension on the exemption first awarded in 2019 Simply they had to get doors fixed The ORR made a few unannounced inspections and this together with a number of independent reports provided to them determined that West Coast weren t adhering to the agreed mitigation plan and that started this current debacle of WCRC dragging out compliance with the ORR decision and subsequent court ruling in December 2023 WCRC introduced a fleet of carriages six passenger vehicles and a generator van hence less passengers and trips being cancelled with central door locking in April 2024 The doors aren t fixed they ve pulled a pretty sneaky manoeuvre which I suspect is technically in breach of the rulebook Essentially the formation has been made of the the traditional 1950s Mark 1s alternating with 1970s air-conditioned Mark 2Fs The 2Fs have Central Door Locking Through cables have been run down the train to permit control of the door locking throughout and the external doors on the Mark 1 vehicles are fully locked There is therefore no emergency egress from the Mark 1 vehicles short of breaking a window passengers entering and exiting from the doors on the adjacent Mark 2Fs My objection is that locking passenger doors with no means of emergency release is completely against the rules It was deemed a contribuory factor in the 1868 Irish Mail accident under and when it was found some staff were still unofficially practicing it in the 1970s as a means of segregating passengers on sleeping car trains it was a contributory factor in casualty numbers in the Taunton Sleeping Car Fire BR made it explicitly clear no doors were to be locked on vehicles in passenger service in any circumstances WCR are sealing people into these Mk 1 carriages with no means of escape in the event of an Emergency that required the carriage be evacuated In the event of the train hitting something it s possible that these cables get severed thus preventing the use of the doors as an escape route Couple this with poor reviews on trip advisor and trust pilot of the trains being dirty unclean and food not being a high quality dining experience overall it s not safe and not worth the money There are other heritage railway providers who have gladly installed central door locking the trains are clean high quality and much better than WCR Lots of tourist destinations like Fort William and Mailag complained when the Harry Potter Jacobite train might not run due to the exemption not being renewed but the safety of passengers comes before profits Read the following Wikipedia pages to see what other breeches of safety WCR have done Look under history on the following page West Coast Railways2015 Wootton Bassett rail incident

Very disappointing never worth the money check what you will get before you pay

We travelled on the Jacobite steam train from Fort William to Mallaig on 11 August 2024 something we had booked several months for a special anniversary and were very much looking forward to based on the beautiful photos and description on their website Unfortunately it was a massive disappointment The train we were on was not the steam train we had booked and the whole experience was totally different We were advised AFTER the train had set off that the locomotive in use that day was a diesel engine not the steam engine we had purchased tickets for The reason given was that the engine in question was undergoing scheduled maintenance which by definition means it was known in advance that the steam locomotive would not be available for that particular trip and yet we were not made aware of this prior to our trip Looking at Jacobite train Terms and Conditions they reserve the right to use a replacement diesel engine in case of failure of the steam engine which was not the case in that instance To make matters worse passengers were not allowed to stand near the doors to take photos and because the windows were very dirty on both sides it was not possible to take any pictures throughout the journey To add insult to injury the ventilation throughout the carriages was non-existent and the lack of an opening section on the windows made it difficult to breath at times as the sun made the air inside the carriages very hot To top it up the engine broke down on the way back and the train remained stationary for about hour The whole situation was laughable some people around us were trying to calm their children down who were crying and my husband started feeling faint after a while because of the lack of air One of your crew members had to help The whole experience was not at all what it was supposed to be based on the information provided on the Jacobite train website including the lovely pictures of a steam engine In essence along with many other people on board that train some with children who had travelled from abroad for the Harry Potter experience we felt completely let down and critically misled in believing we were purchasing tickets for a different experience altogether e g Described as the greatest railway journey in the world We contacted West Coast Railways to express our disappointment and try to obtain some logical explanation as to why we were not made aware of this planned changed before our trip the option to cancel with a refund would seem like the right thing to do Based on the conversations around us that day we strongly suspect many others would have done the same things Sadly the response was not entirely surprisingly very disappointing Basically some additional clause provided a way out of the whole thing none of the points we had raised totally inadequate ventilation filthy windows engine breakdown other than the switch of locomotive were addressed leaving us feeling like they were washing their hands off it with no offer whatsoever of some form of compensation even perhaps towards a future trip to soften the blow This was never worth the money we paid for our tickets that day and we would warn people to check before you book that you will indeed get what you are led to believe you will get Based on other similar and recent reviews West Coast Railways seem to knowingly continue doing this

Horrible horrible customer service

Horrible horrible customer service agent She was nasty and could not care less When I told her I wanted to complain about her she said put it in writing I did I have had an email saying it will take 6 weeks Do not book unless you want people who do not care

The Jacobite Express

The trip on the Jacobite Express something we looked forward to a trip through lovely scenery on a steam train The carriages were so dirty difficult to see out of the windows don t think they have been cleaned in a long time The headrest on my seat was not fixed securely the walls and around the seats were grimy The lighting going through tunnels didn t work not all the toilets were working we were served a weak small cup of tea and 2 small biscuits on both journeys The stewards looked bored and no uniformity in their appearance not a very attractive image No steam train for us as it was running only in the morning many foreign visitors were so looking forward to that and were disappointed Many children thought it was a Harry Potter experience and for the many a big disappointment as the only input on that was the sale of tawdry expensive gifts Surely more could be made of that angle I felt ashamed on behalf of the many foreign visitors by the very poor presentation of the coaches The scenery was beautiful and we are lucky to visit this lovely part of the UK This trip cost my husband and I 214 75 This did in no way compare to other vintage steam train trips we have been on with other rail companies in value for money

Booked this trip last year

Booked this trip last year got an email to say they have cancelled without accommodating on another day avoid at all cost waste of time and money

Staff curtness - could do better

Staff - curt uninformative which resulted in us missing our train due to misinformation As my wife has a current disability the design of the carriages was not conducive to mobility issues Very poor experience not likely to use this company for any future travel

Should be an experience to remember for good reasons not bad

Just arranging a booking on Jacobite train journey My son got us a voucher to go on the journey and due to situation out with our control we have had to go STD class which only uses up 2 3 of the value the amount left is non refundable it s a lot of money which we or my son will loose WCR are totally inflexible

An awful experience to remember

I have booked a journey on Jacobite train Due to severe hot condition on 19th July all trains from London Euston and Kingscross has been cancelled without an ETA It is lot of money I lost for the journey and is non-refundable I have phoned messaged WCR as a good will gesture please transfer the ticket in Sep so that I can re-book my holiday and visit again But WCR completely inflexible