Virgin Trains has today launched a new partnership with the taxi firm, Uber, to enable passengers to easily request a taxi from the station on arrival at their destination.
The partnership is part of Virgin Trains' ambition to provide passengers with a smooth door-to-door experience, encouraging passengers to leave their cars at home.
Starting today, passengers buying their ticket on the Virgin Trains website will have the option to get an SMS reminder with a link to book an Uber trip*. There will be a two-week testing period to optimise the service through customer feedback.
Passengers who select this option will be eligible for 50% off their first Uber journey up to a maximum value of £10**. This will first be available for passengers travelling either from London Euston to Birmingham New Street (or Birmingham New Street to London Euston) ahead of a roll-out across other Virgin Trains stations, including Birmingham International, Glasgow Central, Milton Keynes Central, London Euston, Manchester Piccadilly, Edinburgh Waverley and Edinburgh Haymarket, later this year.
This is just another innovation for Virgin Trains, the train operating company recently launched the ability to buy train tickets using your Amazon Alexa device. More on that can be read here.
What did the officials say?
Sarah Copley, Executive Director, Commercial at Virgin Trains,said:
“We know that tackling the first and final mile is critical to opening up rail travel to new customers. Our exciting new partnership with Uber is the next step in making this end to end journey easy and seamless for customers.”
Fred Jones, Head of Cities at Uber, commented:
“In order to make it easy to leave your own car at home, we want door-to-door experiences to be as seamless and convenient as possible. This partnership with Virgin Train is an exciting first step towards offering customers an easy way to combine train and car travel at the touch of a button.”
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For more information
*- Dependent on the availability of an Uber driver at the departure/arrival station(s). Only applies to outbound journey and not return leg.
** – The promotion is only available for individuals that sign-up for a new rider account with Uber via the promo link provided to the intended recipient. Standard terms and conditions will apply.
At least it’s not Virgin Trains East Coast because Virgin/Stagecoach Group are to lose the East Coast franchise to a government owned rail franchise called London North Eastern Railway that will start from June 24th this year.