Travelling is not always relaxing. Especially when your mode of transport gets delayed. Recently, passengers travelling from Birmingham to Gatwick had to face a three-hour delay owing to various issues. A UK woman who was travelling with her ailing father ended up losing around £2,500 because she had to rebook and reschedule her flight and hotel bookings. Here are all the important details that you would need to know about this unfortunate incident.
UK Woman Loses £2.5K After Missing Flight Due To Coach Delay
According to an article recently published by the BBC News, Yolanda Reeves had a flight from the London Gatwick Airport to Jamaica. She was travelling with her ailing father and the cause for travel was a sombre one. They were headed to Jamaica to help plan a funeral. On November 6, the party was heading to Gatwick from Digbeth, which is located in Birmingham.
The National Express coach was slated to arrive at Digbeth at 4:20 GMT but ended up being 25 minutes late. That was the first of the many delays that came on the journey. The bus then had to ask all the passengers to get off because the toilet was broken. As per the BBC article, it left at 5:30 GMT. But then, a change in driver at the city’s airport caused a delay of another 30 minutes.
The coach arrived in Oxford at around 9:20 GMT. This was when the coach was scheduled to arrive at Gatwick. Then, there were some issues with the driver’s radio and at 11:20 GMT, they were stranded at Heathrow. They finally made it to Gatwick at 12:40 GMT but it was already too late. It was already 40 minutes after the departure gates to her flight were closed.
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National Express Apologises And Promises Refund
In the BBC article, Reeves said that it was overall the worst journey that she had ever experienced and that she was at least glad that her ailing father did not have to go through the ordeal alone. The missed flight and the rescheduling of hotel bookings ended up costing Reeves a total of £2,500 (₹2.6 lakh).
The appointments for the funeral she was helping to organise also had to be rescheduled. She was not the only passenger who ended up missing their flight. Many on the bus including a first-time solo traveller ended up missing flights.
National Express, in the BBC article, said that this was not the kind of customer experience it wanted to deliver. The coach operator regretted the inconvenience caused to the passengers and stated that affected customers would be reimbursed for their inconvenience.
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Have you ever had a similar experience while travelling? Let us know in the comments section below!
Cover Image Credits: Wikimedia Commons
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First Published: November 25, 2023 4:01 PM