Eastmidlandstrains Reviews 

Back from a recent day trip to London and had hoped that the new owners might have improved things. However, the carriages on both legs were ancient, dirty and overcrowded. The reservation system wasn't working (somebody was in my seat but the display above the seat said "unreserved"). There is no competition on this line so I can't see any advantage of it being run by private companies, all of whom have failed on this route. The staff on the trains were however did their best.

Possible the worst customer service of all time. I bought a ticket for the wring date by accident, called them to change the date. They advised that there systems are down and can’t change it (for an additional £10 which is a scam it takes 2 minutes on the computer). They advised if I buy a new ticket I can get a refund, I bought a new ticket on Trainline and they refused to refund the ticket even though I was on the EMR train!! Just booked again mistakenly through the train line ad the EMR website is terrible. Never going to use EMR in the future. The customer service is based in india as I couldn’t get through to anyone who wasn’t based in a call centre.

Terrible journey. Dirty trains and toilets. The train was boiling. No way to open windows and no ventilation at all! Never again.

Most of the time I find EMR trains and staff are more than good enough and I just live with the odd delay - BUT Delay Repay seems to be deliberately (or accidently) designed to make it nearly impossible to make a claim - I work in digital service design and there were so many dark patterns, misleading elements and duplicate data entry traps that it took me an hour to submit my claim for a delayed train. In the end I only kept going because I was determined to see if it was possible (it is) but so, so difficult
UPDATE - While EMR have agreed compensation they have offered 25% for 15+mins, where the train was over 40 minutes late which should be 50% - alas because EMR take 10 days to evaluate a claim by which point RealTimeTrains no longer contains real travel data. Luckily recentraintimes keeps data longer if you need it and the EMR appeal process is very easy :)

No direct train to Doncaster from Nottingham despite it being close (I’m sure they’ve got some excuse). Info boards wrong at Grantham train station led to me getting on the wrong train
Useless.

Staff are brilliant from Ritch at Loughborough train station to all the friendly and helpful train crew. Service on time, staff are a real asset to you

If I could give them 0 I would. I’ve been travelling with EMR for many years and every time the service just gets worse and worse. They have the most god awful people working for them. The staff are just plain rude and unhelpful. They always act like they’re so much better than all of their customers and then treat us like dirt. There are too many awful incidences that have occurred but a couple that come to mind are when there were several tube delays which led to me missing my train. I told the gentleman at the London St Pancras Information desk what had happened and he was so unhelpful. He told me to just go and buy another £100 ticket because it’s tough and my fault. The same incidence has happened to me on LNER and Avanti and the staff there were extremely helpful and printed me a new ticket for the later train without an additional fee. Another instance on EMR was when I the ticket collector asked for my railcard and as I had just gotten a new phone, I wasn’t logged into my Railcard app to show her. Instead of waiting for me to do so she just confiscated my Day Travel Card ticket and walked off. It wasn’t until the last 5mins of the journey where I managed to find the collector. She was sat in first class playing games on her phone. Eventually after finding her I showed her my railcard and she handed me my ticket back. She didn’t even bother to thank me or come back to ask for my railcard. She was just plane rude.

Splitting trains changed just before Nottingham causing chaos and the conductor was rude and very unhelpful.... shocking service Will never use these again

THE TRAIN SERVICE AND TELEPHONE SERVICE IS DISGUSTING. THEY CLEARLY CARE NOTHING ABOUT YOUR CUSTOMERS. THEY TAKE YOUR MONEY BUT DON’T PROVIDE TRAINS. THEN THEY TRY TO AVOID GIVING REFUNDS. I WILL NEVER TRAVEL WITH THIS APPALLING TRAIN LINE AGAIN!

Trains are dated, dirty and in terrible condition. Some seats have no cushions just plastic to sit on.
Extremely overpriced for nothing. Almost every second journey is delayed and the reservation system hardly ever works which always cause some issues and leave people very upset. Terrible value for the money. Try to avoid if you can.
Only positive - staff is very nice and helpful!

The filthiest and most dated trains I have had the misfortune to travel on. The hygiene standards are appalling. Do not bother paying extra to travel first class as there is absolutely no difference. Where is the money this awful company charges its customers going? Definitely not on any kind of maintenance or customer satisfaction. Avoid.

Awful, they're at least consistently awful. No point booking seat as never get the seat you pay for. Had to stand for 1h40m on long route from London to Leicester and this isn't the first time!

Crowded, over booked service. More concerned with profit than providing a decent service, then the greedy bast*rds have the cheek to keep raising rail fares!

Terrible trains made up of a fleet of knackered old hand-me-downs from other rail companies....EMR cant even be bothered to rebrand...literally placing stickers over previous logos. Inside of carriages are old, dirty, tatty and uncared for, trains are unreliable due to age and maintenance issues...an embarrassment to behold!

The worst train with the worst arrogant staffs

Travelling home on the 17:32pm from London and despite the lack of catering the kind Train Guard Steph offered to get me a drink from First Class. She was so helpful and professional that EMR should recognise her for she is a true asset to the business. Thank you Steph and EMR for making my journey both special and memorable.

Went first class to London no ticket inspection so filled up with youths with foul language cost me £220 to travel to London ,the train inspector was too busy chatting with other staff on front train .I will never travel with theses again

No compensation for trains not stopping at a station caused by overcrowded trains. On Sun 30th Oct 2022, two successive East Midlands trains did not stop at Bedford train station, due to over-crowding. This meant I was delayed by over 30 minutes. To make matters worse, staff at Bedford train station did not make any announcements the trains that would not be stopping; generally unhelpful staff at Bedford train station seemingly doing as little as possible; there were staff on the platforms but not doing anything. We definitely need to modernise the working practices on our railways.

East Midlands policy for compensation for delays is that if you are delayed by more than 15 minutes you can get compensation. However, if the train did not stop due to overcrowding, then there is nothing. When I initially made the claim for compensation to East Midlands train, I was not aware of the latter aspect on their policy, but I was advised of this by their complaints team after they received my complaint. They said advised that they would still look into this for me as a ‘good will gesture’. I was then asked to provide all the details again that I had already provided by completing the on-line compensation form. Then, I received an automated response saying that “Our Delay Repay scheme applies to journeys where there has been a delay of 15 minutes or more. We have checked your journey and on this occasion, we could not find a delay of 15 minutes or more”. So, this good will gesture seemed to evaporate and I just wasted my time sending in the information twice. I did ask the team member what had led them to change their mind for good will, but I was ignored. Our train industry has contempt for passengers; it’s overpriced, overcrowded, delays every day – that’s when the trains are running and unhelpful staff. As a passenger on the receiving end of all this, I do not support the train strikes.

My trains have been cancelled (strike) totally last minute - not even 24 hours notice!! - and the company I booked with won't refund me... they said I have to rebook for the same destination for another time - but there are no trains available to get me there on time and it would also be more expensive anyway. They told me to call East Midlands to sort who just tried to pass the buck back to where I booked. I said "But it's East Midlands who have cancelled isn't it?" the guy said "well yes" but still was no help at all. Absolute joke! This has ruined mine and my friends weekend completely as we now can't go away and see each other as we can't get there. I'm so upset. The guy on the phone wasn't helpful either. I couldn't be less impressed or more angry.

Terrible. Dirty trains, unhappy staff, broken seats, closed toilets - and that’s if you can actually use your ticket as they always seem to be on strike!
Almost impossible to get a refund on tickets due to strike action. Travelling by train will be my last resort from now on.
Get your act together EMR!!!