RENFE may sue rowdy stag group removed from AVE train

As RENFE has a punctuality clause in its customer contract on its high-speed AVE line, if one of these trains arrives late, passengers are automatically entitled to a 50% rebate on the money they spent on their tickets.

And the drunken stag party group may be ordered to pay RENFE the cost of that refund, in addition to other expenses.

The group of 13 young men were on the Madrid-Málaga AVE line on Friday night, which left the Spanish capital at 19.30, but despite repeated warnings about their behaviour and how they were causing severe disturbance and discomfort to other travellers, they continued to act boisterously and inappropriately.

RENFE says that any passengers who act in a way that 'disrupts order on board its trains', including putting other travellers in physical danger or causing 'extreme disturbance' through 'disorderly behaviour', or who potentially causes damage to the train itself or affects its security can be removed from the convoy with no ticket refund.

On this occasion, when the warnings failed, police were called and all 13 were ordered to leave the train when it reached Córdoba station.

They are believed to have been arrested as they alighted.

Now, the remaining 296 travellers are entitled to get half their ticket price back, since the Córdoba stop lasted 23 minutes longer than usual and, despite the driver trying to make up the time, still arrived in Málaga 21 minutes late.

Although at least two stag parties have been removed from aeroplanes so far this summer, the case on Friday was the first of a group of this type being ordered off a train.

Photograph: RENFE