Lumo Reviews 435

Thanks for your help with claim LMO-1514-550-843. Appreciate it!

Disappointing service and poor customer experience

I’ve used Lumo intermittently over the past three years, but the service has consistently been below expectations. Staff are often curt and unhelpful, and the overall attitude toward passengers feels indifferent. On my most recent journey, I experienced behaviour that made me feel unfairly treated and uncomfortable. It left a very negative impression. Sadly, I’ve decided not to travel with Lumo again or recommend it to others.

I can't understand all the negative reviews. I travelled from Morpeth to London this morning in a pretty full train and it was excellent for the money. Bang on time, clean train, staff fairly brisk but polite. Exactly what I would expect from a budget service. Expectations set for the timing of the trolley and a nice cup of tea to boot. I'd use Lumo again and readily recommend them.

I booked 12.18 train to Morpeth on wed 24th Sept 25.
I travelled by tube from Wimbledon to King's Cross. I was v tired on getting to King's Cross. I suffer from Cancer which doesn't help.
I asked for assistance by way if a wheelchair, and you obliged. Your Assistant was most helpful. He also asked me if anyone was meeting me in Morpeth. I confirmed my Partner was doing so and thought nothing more of it.
Imagine my complete surprise to find one of your workers waiting for me with a wheelchair at Morpeth Station. I was in shock, never expected such wonderful service. Morpeth can be a difficult station to navigate so I was extra delighted .
I would always use and recommend Lumo following this wonderfully service.

Fast, cheap and easy to use. Staff on the train were very attentive and friendly. The train was just over 30 minutes late to the final destination (not Lumo´s fault) and they quickly processed a 50% refund.

Great service and would defo use them again!

On 15 September I go to Newcastle whit lump everything was okay but next day on 16 September I come back to London 3 hrs I was feeling I'm inside the freezer not in train crazy cold

I travelled with Lumo from Edinburgh to King’s Cross on 7 September, and sadly my experience reflects what another reviewer said about staff shouting at passengers. On boarding, I found no space for suitcases and simply signalled to a staff member, who was just finishing an announcement, to ask which direction the luggage compartments were. Instead of assisting, she snapped that I shouldn’t have interrupted her.

In the next carriage I leaned forward to check if there was room for luggage, so I could move on if needed, when the same staff member suddenly appeared and began shouting at me, accusing me of queue-jumping and threatening that if I continued speaking I would not be allowed to travel.

Paying over £80 for a single ticket only to be spoken to in such a hostile and humiliating way is unacceptable. As another reviewer said, I wouldn’t tolerate this even on a free service, let alone one at this price. Staff should support passengers, not berate them. I won’t be travelling with Lumo again.

The Ryanair of the rail, measuring luggage so they can make extra money, like the discount airlines they clearly bonus their staff to find extra revenue by catching people. Don't book with these low-lives, we cannot let that kind of predatory practices expand to the railways!

Just awful, it s Ryanair on the ground. The prices were expensive, coaches rammed. No control, train guards just standing there doing nothing. Twice I had people sitting in my assigned seat on both journeys and was told to move to another seat so people could sit together. Service cart comes around only once in 5hrs.No space to put your luggage, tourists just putting their rucksacks on rails for people’d large luggage. I therefore needed to sit with my luggage between my legs. Just awful train journey. I will do split ticketing next time via another intermediate city. Might be slightly longer but at least comfortable journey to Edinburgh.

To be honest the trains are fine, low-frills but they get the job done. What infuriates me is the process for applying for delay repay compensation and the inability to contact a real human (and of course all email addresses are 'noreply@').
I went to update my delay repay claim and the website told me it was unsuccessful, despite our train being 40 mins late. LMO-3787-433-350

The train left on time. The seats were fine. However....the carriage was absolutely freezing. The air conditioning was just ridiculous. I blew on us for 3 hours. When we (and MANY others brought it up to the crew) we were told that the carriage air con was set by the station and it couldnt be changed. That carriage A they know is freezing then the next 2 are warmer and then gets colder again.....either you have an extremely pointless air con system that cannot regulate between carriages and is unable to be controlled on the train (both of which is beyond ridiculous) or the staff could not care less (which is the impression I got)
It may sound trivial but to sit freezing with air con COLD air blowing in you is no joke.

3 return journeys over the last 2 years on Lumo, out of 6 trains 3 have been delayed by over an hour (one by 2 hours!) so that's a 50% delay rate!

On the latest (and last) occasion our train was delayed leaving Kings Cross by nearly 2 hours which meant my friend and I would have missed 'booked' forward connections to Glasgow to Edinburgh then Glasgow on to Fort William. Despite having seat reservations on the Lumo train, we reluctantly decided to take an LNER service based on the above (Lumo would not have got us there on time!) and decided later to put in a Delay Repay claim. Lumo failed to take any responsibility for their late running service and seems they would rather us have missed our train & delayed our holiday in Scotland.

Back & forth I went submitting the same comprehensive info over and over as per Lumo's request (for whatever reason!). The whole saga went on for more than 2 months but to no avail.

Shame really as the staff on board are helpful and friendly, the service from Stevenage to Newcastle is quicker than LNER but the customer service really sucks.

Awful! Have used Lumo several times to travel to London and in most recent journey on 20th July I was delayed almost 2 hours.

I made a claim here for £83.70 in line with National conditions of carriage and Lumo's own guidelines. However, my claim was subsequently rejected with zero detail or reasoning citing "It doesn't meet the criteria" despite clearly meeting this...

Have emailled customer service with no response.
Have appealled, only to have the appeal show a lower claim amount...

Will not travel with Lumo again if the claim is not paid.

Claim: LMO-4023-429-543

My train was delayed by over two hours and I am still trying to claim a refund. I was told my claim 'didn't meet the criteria' despite already receiving an email from customer services to say that I would be refunded - they raised a claim on my behalf, with all ticket evidence etc. They are now not answering my emails. In addition the website is dreadful and never remembers my password and doesn't save BACS details. All this for a journey on an as ever dirty train with announcements that go on and on and on...

Horrible trolley service, NOTHING HEALTHY WHATSOEVER...ONLY OVERPRICED snacks FULL of ULTRA processed chemicals...APPALLING

Wow - but not in a good way. An absolute disgrace of a journey. Shame on Lumo
We boarded at Edinburgh and found our seat had no window whatsoever - not great for a 4hr30 journey where we'd been hoping for a nice view. I asked the member of staff and she simply told me I didn't order a seat with a window and made comparisons with Ryanair. She told me it was a completely full service, which I appreciate, but the way she handled my query could have been a lot lot better.

Then, a fair distance short of Morpeth, due to what I have strong reason to believe (for multiple reasons) was a pretty serious contravention, (though this is yet to be confirmed to me by Lumo themselves), we ended up stationary for 2hr+, first on the main track, then apparently in a siding. We were told we were awaiting a new driver, who was being taxied up to meet us. 1 can of emergency water was handed out, but food stocks rapidly depleted and by the time we reached Newcastle, we were told they were completely out of food. (Question: Why if you, by that point, knew your journey to London was going to be at least 2hr delayed, would you not phone ahead and get additional catering onboard at Newcastle??). During the 2hr wait in exactly the same spot, one lady was even charged for a cup of hot water. The audacity!

If this had happened to a flight, we would have received food and drink vouchers.

We were told the cause of the delay was external to the train. If the reason is as I believe, it was actually internal to the train. But again, that is yet to be confirmed by Lumo.

Final arriving into Kings Cross over 3 hours late, hungry, tired and with wrecked plans, it's safe to say they could have handled the onboard experience better, and I will not be travelling Lumo again.

It's worth noting that due to the fact they run trains only every c 4hours, it really leaves you in a mess if there is a service disruption. For example, passengers boarding at Newcastle told me they'd simply been sitting on the platform for the best part of 3 hours waiting for the train, whilst watching numerous LNERs go by. But tickets aren't transferrable

I have submitted my claim for a full refund, and also submitted a claim for additional compensation due to the nature, extent and handling of the delay.

Update following response from Lumo 22Jul:
I have two questions please:
1. Do you think it is acceptable for your customers to not only suffer a 3hr+ delay without a free sandwich, but also not even have the ability to purchase one? Is this the sort of train journey you would personally enjoy?
2. Please elaborate on the nature of the operational incident. As mentioned, I am near certain I know the reason. Please either reply to this review to confirm, or if you prefer, please contact me directly to explain the reason.

I have submitted a formal request to your customer service desk for compensation beyond the full refund of the train ticket. Please reach out to that team to expedite that. If, however, you believe compensation beyond a full refund is NOT due, taking into account the length of the delay, the seriousness of the 'incident' and the complete failure to adequately care for your passengers on the catering front, I'd be interested to hear your thoughts on this (as I'm sure other Trustpilot readers will likely be I'm sure!) Failure to provide compensation beyond a simple 100% ticket price refund will be taken as Lumo confirming that they do not believe that a 3hr+ delay, a lack of sufficient catering and such a serious 'incident' is acceptable enough not to warrant this.

Rude staff…

Got on at London Kings Cross to Edinburgh 12.13pm train on 6th July 2025. I am currently sat in carriage A. We get an announcement to say trolley service will start after Stevenage, which was fine. They did mention only 2 staff members on the train, but if the service was taking too long that you could approach the trolley itself. 2 and a half hours into the journey still no trolley. So I wander to find it. A gent at a table beside me had thought the same and had wandered up also. I mentioned to him are you getting food he agreed. This is when the incredibly rude member of staff in a rather aggressive manner “we are doing our best, there is only two of us” okay Louise no on was asking your opinion… why she felt it necessary to ambush us both at this point I really don’t understand. I turned my back at this point to which she said to me… “was every shop at Kings Cross closed?” Again Louise not quite sure what that has to do with you. There could have been a number of reasons as to why I was looking for food, health related or not!

Her attitude and manner were disgusting and completely un called for.

What makes matters even worse is we haven’t approached Newcastle yet and they have ran out of food….! Good job I did go and find the trolley… I am sure everyone can agree that a 4 and a half hour train journey without even a bottle of water is unacceptable.

I have logged a formal complaint with Lumo themselves… watch this space for a response!

They don't clean the trains. One of the reasons why they are cheap.

I booked our tickets well in advance, traveling with a baby and a family of three — you’d think that would come with at least basic consideration or priority. We requested a table seat so we could all sit together with space for the baby, but when we boarded, the train was completely packed. People were standing, no space for luggage, and nowhere for us to sit.

The few table seats available? I only saw one actually being used by a family with an elderly person and a baby — the rest were just occupied by young adults who clearly didn’t need that space. Meanwhile, we were left to stand with backpacks and a baby, struggling to find anywhere to settle.
It felt like the train was overbooked with zero regard for families or accessibility needs. Truly one of the worst travel experiences I’ve had. If this is how LUMO treats passengers who plan ahead — especially those with children — I won’t be using the service again.

My favourite of the London to Newcastle & Edinburgh operators if I'm honest. The seats are a lot more comfortable than on LNER and I like the cheap deals Lumo offers (though every now again LNER do offer them too)!

Obviously this is nothing against LNER, they're also a good operator too. This is just down to personal preference from my experience

My only downside with Lumo but on the other hand praise with LNER is the frequency of trains - Lumo only seem to run roughly 4-5 trains a day compared to LNER running every 30 minutes. But understandably capacity issues means I appreciate that Lumo is unable to add extra trains

That aside, definitely worth giving Lumo a try!