EMR Reviews 

Sadly, I can’t give zero stars. RIP off train fares, services cancelled on a weekly basis, even while you’re on the train. Government puts in a price cap on fares, so what do East Midlands Railway do? Increase car park fees by more than 10% - more than double the rate of inflation. Despicable company. And the most complex compensation process for claiming refunds for late arrivals and cancellations, which obviously is most weeks. I’d say avoid at all costs, but of course you can’t if you want to travel between Kettering and London. Will Rogers should be ashamed.

Caring staff members allowed me to get an earlier train home as I was unwell. They also looked after me. Couldn't ask for better service. Thank you EMR

Late trains and so hard to reclaim compensation. EMR need to change their management recruitment stratagy... Currently they go into a school, go to bottom set maths, ask them who wants a job, they interview any that do, question 1 is "what noise do dogs make?", the child that moos the loudest then gets the most senior post available. Needs nationalising.

I get EMR trains every week and for the past 4/5 months there have been delays on every single train I’ve got. Huge pile ups at St Pancras. And I’m made to stand due to over selling tickets, how is it possible to pay £95 one way on a train a not be given a seat?? Laughable excuse of a train service. And thanks to the brand new “aurora” trains I’m now still standing but there’s some garish screen in front of me. What a shitshow

Had to change three times to get to Liverpool lime Street today. Staff didn't have a clue what was going on. I have never been with a bad train company before. If I have Staff knew what was going on. Awful

Very poor. No air conditioning - absolutely boiling, overcrowded and a very bumpy ride from Norwich to Peterborough.

Most disgusting food in 1st class, honestly like prison snack boxes so full of sugar and preservative crap it is acid reflux in a box.

Staff are actually nice, that is the only thing it has going for it, the people.

On the 30th of May me and my husband travelled first class on the train leaving Nottingham just after 9am to St Pancras, London, and we caught the return leaving London at 19.05.
What can I say, the professional service by the staff on each journey was amazing, all the staff put you at ease and served us in a very professional but warm manner. The journey we took on the train completely removed the stress of travelling to London for us. I am sorry I did not get any names of the staff, but both the female workers who served us on the outgoing train and return, were extremely polite and hard working, they really made our day! their manner was just impeccable.

I would definitely travel first class in the future, it was such a relaxed and comfortable experience, thank you EMR for making our day!

Very good trains & friendly staff , nice and clean

Paid for a First Class seat. Booked well in advance. EMR have done away with seat reservations. No seats available.

Total Shambles

Had the misfortune to travel from East Midlands Parkway to London St Pancras and back today (28 May 2026). Delays in both directions, travelling down we were 5 minutes late departing but 29 minutes late arriving. The journey back was just hell. Pretty much every EMR train departing STP was delayed or cancelled. Cause of delay was cited as ‘trespassers on the line’ for our service, ‘under investigation’ for others. The upper concourse at STP was completely disorganised, just a massive throng of people in 30 degree heat waiting for various trains, no proper queueing system in place. The delay for our train (18.05 to Nottingham) started at 5 minutes, but kept increasing bit by bit until eventually we left around an hour late after fighting our way through the crowd to the barriers. Got onto what appeared to be a lovely brand new train, which even had a new train smell, very comfortable seats (which of course we could not reserve in advance for reasons known only to EMR while they go about replacing their trains) and excellent air con and Wi-Fi. Sadly that is where the good news ended. The toilet door (coach A if anyone at EMR is reading this) would not close properly, kept partly closing and then stopping. Even when it was eventually closed, the locking handle was jammed so it was impossible to lock the door. Announcements were sometimes clear as a bell, but more often than not garbled and hard to understand. Then we were informed that the train would terminate at Leicester and we would have to wait for the train behind us and get on that one to complete our journey (I assume the driver had run out of hours due to the delay, although this was not explained). Train staff did their best and were very apologetic, but this will be our last visit to London using EMR. Delay Repay claim submitted, I will wait and see what the outcome is.

EMR is the worst rail company I have ever dealt with in my life. The scheduled train I intend to get every day is delayed or cancelled every single time. This is not me exaggerating: it literally happens every day. When the trains do arrive they are always dated, filthy and overcrowded. The staff are often rude. Their online customer service seem to have a policy of ignoring customers that voice their dissatisfaction regularly, despite the fact it is THEM who continuously fail to provide a basic level of service.

I travel regularly with EMR on the London to Nottingham route. It is a wonderful train company and the people who work on the route are just lovely. I'm familiar with the team who do the catering for first class and they really make a difference to my journey. I've also been on board when difficult things have happened - most recently when there was a fatality on the line. We were so well looked after by the team in those hours when we were stationary, and they made sure that we had everything that we needed - that everyone on the train was provided with water and biscuits. I was so impressed by the team's professional and humane response and how courageous they were given what they were dealing with.
The new Aurora trains are fabulous, the internet has not gone wrong since Christmas, and I can sincerely say that those hours at the beginning and end of my day make everything else bearable!
Thank you EMR. You are one of the best train companies in the UK, your coffee is fabulous, and the vegan rolls in the morning are great too. Most of all though it's your staff, including the lovely guys who fix things en route when they go wrong.

Boarded the train at 13.55 at St Pancras to depart at 14.05 , they announced twice that they was waiting for a driver then at 14.35 it was announced that the train does not have a driver and we have to board the train behind , we boarded the train behind but we had to wait until they had a driver to move the trains so that we could depart , the train was jam packed , it was announced on the journey that carriage C had no air con , we was sweltering they did hand out water but water is not cooling your body down the most uncomfortable train journey , I was fortunate to get a seat but I seen people standing all the way to Nottingham ,

First train completely cancelled, next running 17 mins late. At least 5 of their services have been cancelled this morning due to "more trains than usual needing repairs at the same time". This is now usual! They say I must have a valid ticket for my train but they don't have a valid train for my ticket. When my train finally arrived it was completely rammed, 10 of us were squeezed into the space between the doors. At every station people struggled to get off because it was so crowded. The carriages were sooo hot. No air con working. My return train was also cancelled, together with the one after that. I eventually gave up and got a bus instead. This is simply not a transport system that can be in any way relied upon.

Free WiFi hardly ever works. The overhead storage is really poor, you can only fit a tiny bag up there so if you have something larger it has to go at your feet.

Whilst not every journey goes to plan I’ve always found that the staff are invariably professional and helpful. EMR can’t be held responsible for events outside of their control but they are good at keeping people informed.

Excellent staff who, as there was a fatality on the line, has to explain platform changes to everyone. They did this with great good humour and politeness. A pleasure to travel with EMR.
Audrey Bevan

I use the EMR service between Loughborough and Leicester to commute to and from work 5 days a week.
The service has been steadily declining for a couple of years but recently it's gone off a cliff. Trains are late, cancelled, overcrowded and very expensive. The old fleet of trains are filthy, the new fleet break down. The delay repay system is a sick joke if you have a season ticket. The only thing staff on the platform at Leicester seem good at, is blowing their whistle as loudly as possible 3 feet away from your head when you're trying to get on the standing room only train. EMR are a disgrace.

A very serious alert to anyone thinking of booking the last train from St Pancras to the East Midlands…….dont!
EMR are truly useless with no respect whatsoever for passengers. Twice in one month they have cancelled our train within a month.
Just look at those reviews! UK government…..take this license off them, they are a bunch of shoddy cowboys with a less than 3rd world operation.
Terrible company