VIA Rail Is Offering Refunds & Travel Credits To Help Make Up For Last Month's Disruptions

VIA Rail has issued an apology to all those affected by cancellations and service disruptions over the holidays and even offered refunds and travel credits for those impacted.

In case you missed the news – or your train! – due to inclement weather a bunch of VIA Rail trains were severely delayed and some even cancelled, between December 23 to 26.

Some people claimed they had to wait 18 hours for what would've normally been a 4-hour trip.

In the wake of these travel setbacks, the CEO of VIA Rail has issued an apology to all those affected.

"We appreciate that passengers were looking forward to holiday celebrations and family get-togethers, and we regret that for many, those plans were disrupted. We didn’t meet your expectations and for that we apologize," said Martin Landry, the company's president and CEO.

"We know, we should have been more forthcoming in sharing information about trains that were delayed and in communicating updates," he continued.

In this same public apology, Landry confirmed that VIA Rail will be "offering a full refund to passengers" as well as "travel credits for those whose trains were completely immobilized."

Along with these commitments to passengers, Landry also said the company will be going over the events of December with outside experts to be better prepared operationally and from a customer service perspective.

"Despite weather events and a freight train derailment beyond our control, it is clear that lessons will be learned, and changes will be made," said Landry.

As of now, there are no details about how, when and where these travel credits and refunds will be dolled out to affected customers.

Narcity Canada has reached out to VIA Rail for more details on this process.

Of course, for some, travel credits won't make up for delayed holiday vacationing, but this does act as a potential salve for a stressful travel experience.