People are beginning to receive replies from Southern - as and when you receive replies, the individual train times in your responses might differ from the one which was sent to a family who use the Wandsworth Common station (and which is the basis for the suggested response below). Please check what Southern says to you personally against the online timetable, to see if it adds up – you might be given alternative routes. The basic points are that (1) the facts Southern state in their response to the Wandsworth Common family are completely wrong!! See below; (2) Compared to the 50+ trains in each direction each day we have now, the new timetable represents a bewildering muddle for anyone travelling to S Croydon – services showing 1 change will take 58 minutes and go via Norwood Junction (except for 2 in the morning rush hour) and the services showing 2 changes could be via Streatham Common/EC, or West Croydon/EC, or on the return Purley/Selhurst – sometimes the trains go via EC/Clapham Junction – it’s a complete mess and very complicated. Take a look yourselves, it’s lunacy. If we receive the same reply as was received by another family who use Wandsworth Common station, we’ll be replying along these lines: “The detail for morning trains given in your reply are not supported by the published timetable – the timetable on ojp.nationalrail.co.uk shows that the trains you refer to (arriving at S Croydon at 08:06 and 08:22) appear to involve 2 changes not 1, as you claim. The return service you suggest for school pupils are completely useless as schools finish at 15:45. And in any event, they are again not supported by the published timetable. The 15:36 actually requires a change at Balham (if pupils were minded to skive the last lesson), it is not direct as you claim. The 15:54 involves changes at both EC and CJ in order to return to Wandsworth Common, not the single change at EC that you mention. Overall we are losing 50+ direct trains a day in each direction and are facing complex journeys at different times of the day, routing via Norwood Junction, Streatham Common, or Purley, as well as the more familiar Clapham Junction and East Croydon – this is a complete disaster for all the thousands of users of the existing Victoria to South Croydon stopping service. For all practical purposes it will be impossible for young people to navigate to and from school when travelling outside the main school start and end times (which often happens due to other appointments or activities). And every single journey lasting less than 30 minutes involves 2 changes. This is unacceptable.’ [THEN ASK FOR SPECIFIC ACTION IN YOUR OWN WORDS]