THE city’s MP met with train bosses to discuss issues such as delays on the Greater Anglia services in and out of Chelmsford.

Vicky Ford asked residents and commuters to send her questions and issues to discuss at the meeting. Some of the concerns raised included improving facilities at Chelmsford station, including providing additional seating.

Mrs Ford said: “A few people wrote to ask when the 15-minute delay repay scheme would be introduced.

“Greater Anglia is not obliged to introduce 15-minute delay repay under their current franchise contract.

“However, they would like to do so and are discussing this with the Department for Transport. I am going to contact the Government ministers to see if this can be sped up.

“In the meantime, Greater Anglia is investing a further £5 million in maintaining and improving the existing trains. The new trains will all have longer carriages and more carriages. This will add about 20 per cent of additional capacity and seats.”

The MP said she thinks the 3.6 per cent fare increase is high and warned commuters to ensure they renew season tickets before the price increase comes in January. She said she has asked Greater Anglia to give her some background information on how local fares compare to those in other parts of the country.

Mrs Ford said: “There have been improvements to delay and refund systems. This does help to hold the company to account and it is much easier to claim the repayment now that this can be done via email.”

A Greater Anglia spokesman said: “At the meeting we outlined actions we have been tak -ing to improve performance, increase seating capacity, refurbish trains and improve station facilities.

“We also confirmed that we are investing further to upgrade the reliability of our existing trains before we replace them all with new trains in 2019/2020.

“The project to introduce new trains is currently on schedule and will lead to more reliable trains with more seats and an improved journey experience for customers.

“We are working on a project to further simplify the process for claiming compensation and we are also hoping to agree an initiative with the Department for Transport to reduce the delay threshold for compensation to 15 minutes from the current 30 minutes.

“We will continue to work together with Vicky Ford and stakeholders, to secure investment in rail infrastructure upgrades in our region which will further improve rail services.”