Accessible Travel

We want to welcome as many disabled and older guests as possible, however we are very mindful that there are additional considerations for safety and comfort when travelling on an overnight service. In turn, we take care to think through the consequences of a potential breakdown in a disabled or older person’s ability to access the service in the way that was expected.

As part of the journey planning and assistance booking process our Guest Service Centre will talk with you regarding:

• Accessibility of the stations you plan to use;
• Accessibility of our trains including rooms, toilets and shower facilities
• Staffing levels at the stations you plan to use

From these discussions, it might become apparent that we need to arrange alternative accessible transport for you at no extra cost, e.g. if you wish to use a station that is inaccessible to you (for example, because of stairs). Alternative accessible transport will take you between the inaccessible station and the nearest or most convenient one that is accessible to you.

When we organise rail replacement services because of planned or unplanned disruption, we draw on a range of suppliers to coordinate vehicles given the remote locations and night-time nature of our services. We will always ensure there is an accessible option for you. For this reason, we will discuss your needs before booking rail replacement, giving you the added choice to re-book your travel with us or explore other travel options based on your individual access needs.

We are aware that travelling long distances by road or staying in a hotel might be difficult for a disabled or older person. For this reason, we encourage you to contact our Guest Service Centre to discuss your needs in advance, our policy is to be open and transparent and to enable you to make informed decisions.

Please be aware that accessible taxis are usually unable to carry scooters and so we cannot guarantee the arrangements set out above can be offered to scooter users. If you are a scooter user, we will explore and discuss with you what options are available. This will include understanding if your scooter can be folded and whether your scooter can be safely secured in a vehicle under the manufacturer’s recommendations. If neither of these options are possible, we will work with you to look at alternatives e.g. support you to travel home (securing your scooter safely overnight) and arranging transport for you to collect your scooter the next day or as soon as practicably possible.

Assistance dogs are warmly welcome on board. Please let an onboard host know how we can make your dog comfortable, e.g. providing water. If you are travelling with us in seated accommodation, please contact our Guest Service Centre in advance to reserve a seat next to you at no additional cost to enable your dog to sit safely at your feet. Subject to availability we will upgrade you to a room free of charge.

Caledonian Sleeper accepts many national railcards, including:

• Senior railcards, entitling the guest up to 34% off rooms (not including the Caledonian Double) and seats.
• Disabled Persons Railcard (DPRC), entitling the guest up to 34% off rooms and seats rooms (not including the Caledonian Double) and seats.

If you experience a problem, please let our on board hosts know so we can try to resolve the issue immediately. When assistance has been booked in advance, confirmed and not provided to you, please tell us and we will investigate this thoroughly. When you contact us with any complaint (by phone, post or email) we aim to respond fully in 10 working days. If there is a reason we can’t do that, we will keep you updated until we can respond. After we have investigated the matter, we will explain to you why assistance was not provided to you and what steps will be taken to ensure it doesn’t happen again. We may also offer compensation, e.g. a full or partial refund. Alternatively or additionally, you may want reassurance that our staff training programmes have been updated to help stop the issue happening again. This will be determined on a case-by-case basis to ensure we do the right thing. We will own and coordinate any claim about assistance which failed if you were travelling on, or due to travel on, one of our train services. If you booked assistance with us for a journey to travel with more than one operator (including our services) you only need to make one claim. We will coordinate the response for you unless the bulk of the failed assistance was provided by another operator, in which case they may respond to you directly. If we make arrangements for the claim to be passed to another operator, we will ask your permission first.

Like most trains across the UK, we can carry wheelchairs, scooters and rollators which are no larger than 70cm x 120xm and a combined weight of guest and wheelchair/scooter of 300kg. Guests are asked to check the size and weight before travelling to avoid disappointment.

Our Station Accessibility Guide provides accessibility information for the stations we call at in England and in Scotland. These include details on accessible ticket counters, Blue Badge car parking spaces and more.

Please note:
We do not operate stations and the above information on Station Accessibility is based solely on Information we have sourced from the Station Facility Operators. These details are provided in for information only and we make no representation or warranty of any kind regarding the accuracy, reliability and completeness of the above. We recommend that you review your travel details including station accessibility, prior to your journey.

Caledonian Sleeper recognises the Sunflower Lanyard Scheme. The nationwide Sunflower Lanyard Scheme is aimed at helping our guests with hidden disabilities get the assistance and support they need on their journey. If you board our trains with a Sunflower Lanyard, our staff have been trained to recognise that you may require additional assistance. You can order a Sunflower Lanyard for free from us by contacting our Guest Service Centre You can also purchase a Lanyard from the Hidden Disabilities store at https://hiddendisabilitiesstore.com/

1 800 103 300 600 500 If you are hard of hearing you can contact us through the RNID’s Text Relay service. Text Relay, or Next Generation Text (NGT), is a service run by the Royal National Institute for the Deaf (RNID) and funded by BT using textphones and RNID Text Relay Assistants. It helps deaf, deaf-blind, hard of hearing and speech-impaired people make and receive calls to and from hearing people. How you use NGT depends on what you need it for. To help keep it simple, the service has been split into four sections to match individual’s needs.

• Type & Read is best if you can’t hear and don’t use your voice
• Speak & Read should be used if you can’t hear but do use your voice
• Type & Hear will be most useful if you can hear but don’t use your voice
• Speak & Hear works best if you can hear and want to speak to someone who uses NGT

To call our Guest Service Centre via a textphone dial 1 800 103 300 600 500 and Text Relay Direct will connect a Text Relay Assistant into the call if needed. No pause is needed between ‘18001’ and the phone number, it is treated as one complete phone number and can be stored as a single number in the phone’s memory. If you would like us to call you back on your textphone, please advise us that you use a textphone and we will use the Text Relay Service when we call you. To find out more about the RNID’s Text Relay and the Next Generation Text (NGT) service, including using the app on your device, please visit https://btplc.com/inclusion/MakingCallingEasier/Textrelay/index.htm

If there is planned engineering work, our Guest Service Centre will contact you in the way you said you would prefer to be contacted when you booked assistance. They will tell you about any planned disruption and discuss what alternative arrangements might need to be put in place at no additional charge. To view information on upcoming services impacted by engineering, please visit https://www.sleeper.scot/service-alterations/ . This page will also note any reductions the accessibility features of our train or the stations we call at, if this information has been provided by the station operator.