First time that I have ever posted to this newsgroup. This morning we were
booked on the 07:10am Dubbo XPT from Sydney Central. They couldn't get it
going and announced a number of times, "there will be an indefinite delay in
the train's departure". As we were only going to Wellington for a picnic to
show some overseas visitors some more of NSW and as we only had a couple of
hours while the train continued to Dubbo and back we decided at 07:35am to
ask for a refund and complimentary tickets back to our home station at East
Hills. We had to fight and demand the tickets back to East Hills as we
weren't going to be out of pocket for anything. After a lot of heat we
finally got the City Rail tickets.
We were told, by the Countrylink Reservations Manager at Central that, "this
is the first time that this sort of delay has ever happened with the Dubbo
XPT". The train did eventually leave at 07:43am but after we had already
asked for a refund and asked at 07:35 if there was any update to the
"indefinite delay". Is this true? Is the Dubbo XPT quite reliable?