To expect to be able to book assistance when travelling alone by train with a small child?

[DTwelve]

This is possibly a non-issue as it has been mostly resolved (train company gave me a 'goodwill' refund in the form of vouchers) and although I claim to have altruistic intentions, I'm secretly just hoping that I WNBU fighting for a refund because customer relations definitely made me feel like I was. I'm rubbish at being brief and don't want to drip feed so apologies for length.

So in early June, I booked some advance tickets to travel by train to see my family with DH at the end of August. I've made the journey before on my own and with DH and DD but this time I would have had DD (18 months) and been 5 months pregnant together with the pushchair (foldable mclaren, not a tank) and all the luggage. The journey is fairly long and involves a change of trains at Peterborough (over the huge bridge for those familiar with the station).

After booking the tickets, DH's work discovered that they had accidentally double booked holiday and someone would have to change. Apparently the only person who could change their holiday was DH (I may have been a little hormonal over this at the time but that's another story). As the tickets were advance, non-refundable and would cost £60 to change (£10 per person, per journey) we eventually decided the best idea was for me to travel alone with DD.

A few weeks before travelling, I rang the train company to book assistance. I was told that it was not their policy to allow either parents with young children or pregnant women to book assistance and although there 'should' be help available, if anyone elderly or disabled needed assistance, there would be no help available for us.

This was not what I had expected so I thanked the man for the information, hung up and panicked.

I would not physically be able to travel without assistance. If I left the pushchair down with DD in it, then I couldn't push the pushchair and carry the luggage (I can in a straight line, but not up and over that bridge at P'boro) and may have to leave DD unattended on a train during boarding to manage my luggage and if I folded the pushchair and strapped it over my back, then I would not be able to hold DD's hand on a busy platform/train and get the luggage onto the train myself all in a short space of time while contending with other people during the school holidays (so it would probably be fairly busy). I'm pretty sure I'm not meant to carry heavy things while pregnant anyway.
There was a chance I could get help from the station staff and a chance I could have considerate fellow passengers who would help but I didn't want to rely on luck and risk getting stranded.

The other options I considered were to pay for new tickets when DH could travel with me (expensive), get someone to travel to Peterborough with me to help me change trains (also expensive and they wouldn't be allowed to board the train with me without a ticket), go without the pushchair (30 minute walk to the station my end) or fight to see if I could get the train company to change their mind.

I called them and started off calmly but by the time I got to the third assistant, I was a massively awkward (albeit terribly polite) customer who knew my rights (and I couldn't afford to visit her family if this didn't work so I felt I had nothing to lose). I quoted the equality act about pregnancy being a protected condition, the right to use (land based) public transport and that it was a reasonable adjustment given my situation to be allowed to book help. I felt horribly guilty and demanding because I asked for either guaranteed assistance (in writing) or an alternative travel arrangement where I could provide my own assistance. Eventually to shut me up, they agreed to refund the tickets as vouchers but it took a very polite and insistent fight.

So it should be over now, I need to find an alternative time to travel etc but I can't help wondering though if I should try and see if there's anything I can do to make them change their policies. I'm actually pretty lucky in that I have a DH who can make the journey with me, but there are probably quite a few people (single parents, parents where the other half works away etc) who can't afford their own transport needing to make similar journeys.

WIBU to think that you should be able to book assistance if travelling alone with small children? If I was and I've missed something, how do other people manage similar train journeys that involve changing trains and more luggage than a changing bag?

Sorry YANBU to want to be able to book assistance. I agree with whoever said unthread that the non-disabled could be charged, perhaps. But in your position I think I would still have travelled anyway.

Someone upthread said they would like to be able to look at photos etc for railway stations - you can for a lot of them on national rail website where you can plan a route through the station and it gives photos and maps too

www.nationalrail.co.uk/stations/sjp/PBO/stationSearch.xhtml

Bizarrely it says Peterborough is completely step free as there is a ramp for those who need it.

I have had similar discussions with southwest trains - when I asked a platform guard to help me carry my double buggy with 1 month old twins onto the train (2ft gap between platform and train, and was still in c-section recovery) he refused, telling me that if I wanted help I should book in advance. When I tried to book in advance the operator told me this was only for disabled passengers (fair enough -until guard told me I had no intention of booking!) and basically told me I probably wouldn't be able to use the station until my twins were old enough to walk onto the train themselves - great, thanks. As it happens I have found members of the public usually very willing to lend a hand.

I once had to travel to stay with a relative just before I gave birth, so not ideal time to travel anyway. I had my dd1 (about 18 months) with me, no choice not to travel (as needed to go to new accomodation urgently). I set off, thinking someone is bound to help me, and a couple of times people did, but I got stuck (8 1/2 months pregnant, not able to bend down) at the top of a flight of stairs, there was only one man around so I asked him if he could carry my suitcase. He did, I followed with my dd1, whereupon he turned round and started shouting at me that I shouldn't have travelled if I couldn't have managed by myself and it was ridiculous for me to go out at all. Some teenagers came and asked me if I was alright as he was shouting so much and then he stormed off.

I travelled the rest of the way on the verge of tears.

Obviously it would have been better not to have had to ask, but wait for an offer, but no one else was around.

It would have been better not to have had to travel at all, but I wasn't about to tell that twat exactly why I had to make the journal so late in the pregnancy.

It would also have been better if the station was properly disabled access so you could use a lift and not steep stairs which are bad not only for heavily pregnant women, but wheelchair users, buggies in general, older people and so on.

People are not always nice, and sometimes pregnancy is a temporary disability, especially if your muscles are shot through from the last time.

I hasten to ask I was only asking him to take the suitcase from the top to the bottom of the stairs, and I did say 'if it's no trouble, if it's any problem please don't, but clearly he felt obliged and then shouted at me for being cheeky enough to ask.

give over BartletForTeamGB

I think this thread has decided that the OP was being unreasonable.

me like mumsyblouse! I used to have to get a train from a station with really really steep steps and try to bump a buggy up and down it...this was in London, and people would mill past and NEVER offered to help. When I had spd with dc2 I asked a man at that station for help and while he gave it, he turned on me at the bottom of the steps and told me I shouldn't be travelling if I couldn't do it on my own.
I think the OP was NU to call and ask what assistance might be available, but maybe then let her anxiety overwhelm her

I think to be honest you should get a grip. I've travelled Glasgow to London several times with a 13mo, a big dog and 2 large suitcases. People helped when needed but really, it wasn't that tough to manage alone. Don't get why you're so helpless, to be honest.

Take a rucksack and a bag on back of buggy! Seriously you can't manage one child!

My very lovely sister came to see me
Last week with six kids!! On a train and then a bus, and the youngest is a few months, then two year d and a three year old! Seriously OP get a grip and stop acting so helpless.

interesting, OP, as when I became a mother it opened my eyes to things like this, it's not so easy negotiating train stations, buses etc.

I really felt that it suddenly made me dependent on other people for help, and you know what, that was not such a bad thing. On journeys with my wee girl in her maclaren stroller, I would spy out a few 'hopefulls', or if someone offered me a seat, they would be my 'victim' and I would ask them if they could help me off the train/on the train etc.

I would never have thought to ask train station attendants to help me, but unwitting passengers would get snared into my web. i found it really didn't take much to get some help with bags, but then, also you really needed a new found trust in strangers. You will find other mums most helpful, grandparenty types are beautifully helpful as well, but my favourite is and always will be asking big black dudes for some help, cause they are always sweet and helpful and usually a laugh.

A few times people looked at me funny and declined, but for the most part i found that help was there for the asking from the public.

Also to everyone saying to put everything in a rucksack and baby in a sling. Are you forgetting op is pregnant. And 5 months at that. I thought it was universally acknowledged that pregnant woman shouldn't carry heavy stuff. And a baby in a sling is my worst nightmare with sore back Or on MN is this one of the pregnancy guidelines it is alright to ignore?

The actual assistance offered to the elderly isn't that great. They don't go onto the train so once you and your luggage are through the door you are on your own. It is no help to my mother-she can't get to a booked seat on her own or deal with the luggage. I would have thought that was the most difficult part for OP too.

here, here, here.

In fact just googling heavy stuff and pregnancy and you'll get 100s of results. At my work I had to go through health and safety when i was pregnant and i was forbidden to pick up anything heavy, even a box of copy paper which i didn't consider that heavy. My midwife also went through this. I just thought this was one of the wide known things that everyone knew. Andetotally my aunt lost her twins many moons ago and she always attributes it to the stress of carrying her then 3 year old daughter. Although i have heard that as children tend to wrap their legs round you they are in fact helping spread the weight? I know from my 2nd pregnancy that i suffered ridiculously painful back ache and carrying a rucksack full of stuff and a baby in a sling would have ended me, without a doubt.

Personally i just think planning a journey ,whilst pregnant and also with a small child and luggage, and having to rely on the kindness of strangers is just daft and poor planning. Fair enough relying on the kindness of strangers when the unexpected turns up but actually planning to rely on it with no back up just doesn't seem practical imo. I still dont think the OP was B that U.

I think that she was. If the railways are to give that level of service they will pass on the costs by putting fares up. It is difficult but we have all managed it. Work out a way of managing first.

I wonder if a solution would be to allow people to pay for assistance if they don't automatically qualify at larger stations?

I'm sure they used to have these, they were called porters.

"Personally i just think planning a journey ,whilst pregnant and also with a small child and luggage, and having to rely on the kindness of strangers is just daft and poor planning."

So you plan it so as not to need help - in all the dozens of times I have done long distance train journeys with one or two small children and when pregnant, I have never had to ask for help because I planned it.

• Pack very light, and in a rucksack. The person you are visiting can lay in nappies and other bulky items, and you can always do a load of washing. I agree that planning to travel with a heavy suitcase IS bad planning - but not a reason to book assistance, just a reason to buy a rucksack and learn to travel light.

• Look carefully at your changes, and research the stations using the National rail site. There may be easier or less easy stations to change at which may be options when buying your ticket - and remember that the accessibility arrangements at stations are not always obvious from when you have travelled pre-schildren. Birmingham New Street, for example, has lifts going down to a tunnel which is very empty and runs under all the platforms to connect them when wheeling a pushchair ...

• Have, and practise, routines for getting on and off the train. Get yourself set up for leaving the train well in advance.

• Book a seat for the child / children. It's just easier that way!

Teacher, but a lot of people on this thread are saying that to be done, they did it but had to ask the assistance of strangers. Which sounds to me like they were actively planning to rely on the kindness of strangers? This is what I wouldn't feel comfortable with.

Having been in this situation I think YANBU to expect help from rail staff.

However, you could help yourself by travelling as lightly as possible, especially if you are visiting family. Eg I went on a 5 hour train journey with 18 month old DD1 while pregnant- I took a very light foldable buggy and only took one over the shoulder bag for both of us- 2 changes of clothes for each of us, I didn't pack nappies, wipes or toiletries we either borrowed them from family or bought them while we were there.

Nor would I - my point is that for the journey the OP was planning (Peterborough has ramps) there was no need at all to plan on getting help from anyone, it is perfectly possible to manage such a journey without it.

This really why a lot of people drive. Trains are often expensive, a big faff, & don't actually get you from A to B.

People may tell the OP not to bother with the train next time, but there are wider issues at stake. Do we want car use to continue to increase, or encourage the use of public transport? Most Govt policy seems to prefer the former...

I'm a single mum and travel a lot on my own with DS (and with ab epic amount of luggage due to some health problems he has).
It has never occurred to me to demand assistance in the way OP did. Normally what I do is to adapt myself to the situation (carry less luggage, get more practical bags, ensure I leave enough time for changes, etc and smile a lot so people be inclined to help me, and the normally do).

I don't consider myself a macho mum, actually the term deeply offends me. Despite being very ladylike, I don't expect people to be at my service much less so when you are asking for airport assistance, that you wouldn't be reasonable to ask for as you are NOT disabled, at a train station. This is like going camping and expecting a bellboy to carry your bags to your pitch.

I travel to London from Manchester regularly with two small DCs and when I was pregnant. Never had a problem myself, but it is only just over 2hours by train. I use a pull along suitcase and a buggy. I make the older DC, now nearly 4yrs walk onto the train and then get the buggy into the train, someone always offers to help at this point too, and then haul the suitcase in.

IN your situation, I would ahve just pushed your DD in the pushchair over the bridge and pulled along a bag too, it's not that hard is it? If you have no complications in your pregnancy like risk of miscarriage, nothing is going to happen to you.

Re the 'That's why people drive' I'm still puzzled about the OP's reply:

'Yes, I do drive (was a very nervous driver as well but that was over 5 years ago now), but don't currently have a car because I can't free up an extra £200/month or so to get DH through lessons (6 months), buy a car (6 months) and then cover the running costs (ongoing)'

I didn't understand why her DH needed to have lessons, rather than the OP having a couple of refresher lessons. But if she is nervous and unwilling to try facing challenging situations, perhaps the plan is that DH learns to drive and she can become an eternal passenger.