Dangers on Venice Train

We just arrived in Venice after the overnight train from Paris. Had a First class sleeper reservation and a Eurail pass. Turns out it would have been MUCH cheaper to just buy the tickets here. My main issue is that it took hours on hold to ever get an agent. They highly recommended the overnight trains "your kids will never forget it". They sure will not! Everyone in our First Class sleeper car was robbed during the night including cash, Ipads, clothes, and jewellery. Our hotel laughed at us stupid Americans for taking the sleeper! I would hope Rail Europe would research their product better! Lisa, NY, USA.

Paris to Madrid - A Disaster on Strike Day

My sister and I booked to travel to Madrid via Paris on 22nd September 2010.

As we arrived in Paris, Austerlitz, we were advised that the train had just been cancelled owing to a strike. At this point, no-one had any information and for the next two hours we were kept hanging around the station waiting for advice on how to proceed. The lack of communication throughout the following twelve hours was appalling.

We were eventually herded onto a conventional bus and told that we would be taken to the Spanish border. We were not offered so much as a bottle of water and as neither of us had euros or francs and as our credit cards didn’t work, we were unable to buy anything to eat or drink until the second motorway service station. (Meantime, the driver of the bus and our ‘courier’ were able to stop within the first hour, lock up the bus, leave us all to our own devices and enjoy a large supper!).

When we finally boarded the train on the Spanish border we were magnanimously offered ‘breakfast’ which comprised two rather sad pastries and a small cup of coffee. This was the ONLY food/drink offered to us in the entire time we travelled from Paris to Madrid.

You may feel that this is an information overload but it is very important in view of the fact that we are being offered 57% of the price we had paid for our rail trip. I should point out that in addition to the unbelievably poor service we received, we had planned this journey for some time and part of our holiday was a day in Madrid. This wasn’t possible as we only arrived in Madrid with an hour to catch our onward connection.

Whereas we both understand that your company cannot control the erratic behaviour of French unionists, we feel that the lack of any kind of customer service, the abysmal inefficiency of the company arranging our journey and the fact that a significant part of our holiday was ruined deserves more recompense.

Candidly, we should be claiming damages and for Rail Europe, under these circumstances, to be promoting rail travel is shameful and insulting.

The details of our ticket are as follows (it was not possible to scan the document):
Ticket has SNCF as a logo.
Ticket-Reservation
En France, a composter avant 1'acces au train 02ADULT
Date of travel 22nd September
Time of travel 19.47.
Paris Austerlitz to Madrid Chamartin.
Cost £400 for the 2 of us which included dinner and breakfast/shower
Train 409 THT Coach 70 Bed 41 and 45
Non smoker double family
FARE SUBJECT TO CONDITIONS
Carriers
02DUO 1071 1187
There are a load of numbers on the bottom of the ticket and it doesn't say what the numbers are for, they are in this order in lines:
GAENTDUO IV 923885465 CK 6B24DO
PEO7AD 710022283230 REL UK ECS 01 260810 17H47 Dossier QASWCE Page 1/1
08701903742956

We were very badly treated on this journey and I would appreciate a response from you as to how we can proceed to get a satisfactory settlement. Needless to say, 57% of our fare is not, in my view, satisfactory. Penny Clemson, South Africa.