My Seat is Reserved!

As you can see (I hope) from the tickets displayed above, I recently booked a 'Sail & Rail' from Douglas to Shipley return.

Or did I?

Because despite the fact that both tickets quite clearly state 'Seat Reserved,' when I arrived at the Sea Terminal, the man at Steam Packet check-in told me that as I hadn't contacted them, no seat had been reserved.

Ah ha! 'Why then does it say 'Seat Reserved' on it then?' I thrust home.

Epee totally blunted, 'We've asked them not to do that but they still do.'

'Can you get me on then?'

'No problem today but if you do it again in the future, please contact us first.'

All's well that ends well then. Or was it?

'How about the return journey, I am coming back 14:15 on Monday and need to be on that ferry?'

'Sorry but that's fully booked, you'll have to come through Liverpool.'

'But all my rail tickets are to Heysham!'

'Sorry, sir but there's a queue behind you and I haven't the time for this now.'

Time to hit the roof! There again, he was right about the queue and with the Mananan sailing at snail's pace anyway, perhaps this wasn't the occasion to harass an employee, delay the boat and have half the World and his dog blame it all on me.

I really did need to be on that return sailing, having promised to take my boss out for a meal and then to see Morrissey in return for her allowing me to race the Bradford 35k, so after an uncomfortable couple of hours wondering how I should go about things, I asked the purser to check availability on the Monday.

Although they were unable to reserve me a place, they could tell me that there were actually seven seats left before the it was completely full* and when I arrived in Liverpool I was able to secure my return trip.

Needless to say, I have written to both IOMSPCo and Raileasy with whom I made the booking because although it all turned out for me, what if I hadn't been prepared to take 'No' for an answer? What if the next time it happens, it is to a new visitor to the Island or to someone whose reason to travel is more serious than being scared of his wife?

Surely, a carrier and an agent must be able to communicate better or devise a better system than that?

Anyway, meanwhile, you'd probably be better booking it all through the Steam Packet (I hadn't realised that I could) but if you do go through an agent, make sure that your boat passage is confirmed.

*It didn't look completely full to me. There were at least seven seats just in the bar!