Sadiq Khan on Thursday advised passengers hit by delays and cancellations on the Central line to claim a refund for any “poor” journeys.
It came after Tube whistleblowers raised alarming new concerns about the state of the line — and warned of years of chaos due to “inexcusable” delays in upgrading the 30-year-old trains.
Passengers have suffered daily disruption since the start of November due to a shortage of trains, caused mainly by their motors failing.
On Thursday morning passengers again endured “minor delays due to a shortage of trains”.
Refunds can be claimed for journeys that are delayed by 15 minutes or more. Claims have to be made within 28 days.
Mr Khan said: “Anybody who receives a poor service can go to the TfL website. TfL has a very good refunds policy, so I would encourage anybody who is concerned about the service they received on a particular day to go to the website to claim a refund.”
He thanked the whistleblowers for coming forward and revealed he had discussed the issues raised in Wednesday’s Standard with TfL commissioner Andy Lord to ensure that staff with concerns about the state of the trains were able to raise them internally. “It’s not right they need to go to a journalist to report concerns,” he said.
He said: “The reason for the service on the Central line not being as good as it should be is decades of neglect but also a lack of investment from central government on the capital infrastructure of TfL.
“It’s actually because of the concerns with safety that these trains that they’re concerned about are being taken out of service, which means there are fewer trains – which means the frequency of trains is less than it should be.”
Critics have accused Mr Khan of spending millions on pre-election “gimmicks” such as a £123m partial fares freeze rather than investing in the Tube infrastructure.
Mr Khan was unable to say how long an emergency timetable – due next month - would be in place. Its aim is to eliminate large gaps between trains, with a service every three minutes in central London during peak hours and every five to 10 minutes further east.
Mr Khan said he wanted there to be “certainty” so passengers knew how long their journeys would take. “What I would like to see is the average times going down on the Central line, particularly in central London – they may be a bit longer when it branches off.”
