Eurostar Woes

There's nothing more fun than being stuck in the tunnel for 45 minutes due to the explosion of the freight train.

and the 4 hours queuing with well over 400 people (well, due to the mixture of europeans involved, a complete mess that doesn't resemblance a queue) at the ferry terminal trying to buy ticket from one poor girl who's the only one at the time of night dealing with the ticket.

Tell me about it, got to Paris GDN at 3.30pm, got back to London at 1.30am! Wank!

or being stranded on a Greek island because the airline that took you there went into liquidation the day you are flying back and having to pay a premium for 2 flights and a total of 12 hours travel time (instead of 5) and all that with a massive cold and everybody looking at you in disgust as you blow your nose every 5 minutes.

Mind you, I quite enjoyed the experience (I'm a bit weird like that) and at least we didn't have to sleep in an airport for 3 days like so many people.

the airline giant that gone under is probably a bit worse than the explosion in the tunnel...

the experience however made me treasure even the simplest thing when I arrived back home.

very similar thing happened to me once,
I got stuck in tahiti for 3 days because of a fault with a plane,
this would have been great apart from that i was on my way back from snowboarding in the states and was sick to the point of coughing up blood instead of being a great extended holiday i was pretty much in living hell then.
They did put us up in a $150us a night hotel and provide all meals though.

or being stranded on a Greek island because the airline that took you there went into liquidation the day you are flying back and having to pay a premium for 2 flights and a total of 12 hours travel time (instead of 5) and all that with a massive cold and everybody looking at you in disgust as you blow your nose every 5 minutes.

Mind you, I quite enjoyed the experience (I'm a bit weird like that) and at least we didn't have to sleep in an airport for 3 days like so many people.

There's nothing more fun than being stuck in the tunnel for 45 minutes due to the explosion of the freight train.

and the 4 hours queuing with well over 400 people (well, due to the mixture of europeans involved, a complete mess that doesn't resemblance a queue) at the ferry terminal trying to buy ticket from one poor girl who's the only one at the time of night dealing with the ticket.

Two things that don't seem to have anything to do with Eurostar? Did I miss something?

No you didn't miss anything and no it wasn't there fault but they did fuck all to help THEIR passengers. Got to Paris GDN and it was mayhem. All their trains sat at the platform doing nothing. The fire was in the tunnel, what was stopping them from driving trains to Calais and dropping people off at the ferry port then going back to Paris? Nothing, they just let everyone bundle their way up to Calais by their own means whichever way they could. Lazy French cunts!

Ah.. see I was missing that bit. I assumed 'the tunnel' was just some bit of track in France somewhere and they couldn't do anything. Gotcha

with respect, we pay our way to the ferry just after the incident occured, my parents who drove to the station to get in the Le Shuttle were given a token to gain access to the ferry after a couple days.

Eurostar give vouchers as compensation for delays or whatever and they have expiry dates on them.

Would you consider that reasonable? I mean, if your journey is delayed and they give you compensation for it (presumably they are legally required to and this isn't just out of the goodness of their little hearts) then there shouldn't be a time limit on this compensation should there? Or are they just being nice with the vouchers knowing most people won't cash them in?

JFGI: https://help.eurostar.com/faq/uk-en/question/Can-I-get-a-refund-instead-of-an-e-voucher

https://www.which.co.uk/consumer-rights/advice/can-i-get-compensation-for-eurostar-delays-or-cancellations

How long is the expiration date from the journey?

Also, it's shitty.

Also also, I'll give you a fiver for it.

You get 12 months from the problem journey (or maybe the claim date) to use the voucher.
I have £40 worth and you can give me a fiver for them.

It depends on the length of the delay, if it's more than 60 minutes you can claim a cash refund.

I'm due a 75% refund on my outward journey from last week, we were delayed by 220 minutes, which is a lot of fun when you have two kids aged 8 and 5 to keep entertained.

I didn't know about the cash refund though so got vouchers ages ago that have now expired. This annoys me. Not as much as dealing with two kids but enough that I will be getting my £40 back some other way.