Commuters faced more misery on Southern rail this morning after a fault on a train led to delays for those travelling to London Victoria.

According to a station manager the fault on the train heading towards Dorking damaged a stretch of the conductor rail between Epsom and Ashtead leading to cancellations.

This together with the on-going industrial dispute between Southern and the RMT union has left many passengers angry and frustrated as they faced longer journeys into work.

One commuter at Ewell East said: “This is just ridiculous. The service is so unreliable and something needs to be done to improve it. I pay a lot of money for my season ticket and what I do expect is reliability. I just want the trains to arrive on time.”

Another added: “This service is a joke. I have an important meeting this morning which I now have to reschedule. Why can’t Southern get its act together?”

At Ashtead commuters were told that their tickets were acceptable with other rail operators and on buses. Southern added that the rail strike was compounding the problem with services today.