Decision report 201203388

Summary

Mr C said that Transport Scotland had not properly investigated his complaint about a rail provider. Mr C originally complained to a rail provider when a member of station staff refused to issue him with a discounted ticket that he was entitled to under the terms and conditions of a new deal railcard. Mr C said he felt bullied and humiliated by the member of staff. Dissatisfied with the response to his complaint, Mr C escalated it to Transport Scotland who had responsibility for the franchise agreement with the rail company. He said that Transport Scotland unreasonably concluded that the rail company had properly investigated his complaints. He said that they had accepted, without reasonable investigation, the rail provider's claims that he had changed his route when in fact his start and destination stations had remained unchanged throughout and that there were suitable available alternatives for the purchase of discounted tickets. He also said that Transport Scotland had failed to establish whether his complaint had been escalated to the director of the rail provider.

We concluded, however, that Mr C's complaints had been reasonably investigated. Transport Scotland had questioned the rail provider when Mr C disputed the statements they made about the purchase of tickets. They had also investigated, as far as it was possible to do so, whether Mr C's complaint had been escalated to the director. They did not investigate the matter of Mr C having changed his destination stations, because Mr C had never made this point clearly to them. In terms of whether the rail provider had reasonably investigated Mr C's complaint, we concluded Transport Scotland had considered the matter appropriately. They had established how the complaint had been responded to and what actions had been taken to prevent recurrence. We could not find any fault or omission in the investigation process that would lead us to question Transport Scotland's decision.