Virgin Trains has announced that all 56 Pendolino trains will undergo a refurbishment which will see an improvement to the onboard equipment and will allow free WiFi to be extended to all Pendolino customers.

The investment is costing around the £7.5m mark and is part of a new deal agreed with the government. The new deal sees Virgin Trains continue to run the West Coast franchise through to at least 31st March 2019.

Installation of the WiFi upgrade is planned to begin from May 2018 and be completed by January 2019, when Free WiFi will be extended to all customers.

Additionally, Virgin Trains are working to eliminate ‘not-spots’ or places without mobile phone coverage.

What did the officials say?

Welcoming the new deal, Phil Whittingham, Managing Director of Virgin Trains on the West Coast commented: “Virgin Trains has led the industry for more than two decades, and I’m delighted that we have secured a new contract to continue operating on the West Coast. The investment will see a big improvement in our onboard WiFi and follows our industry-leading innovations such as automatic delay-repay and free films and TV onboard via our Beam app.

“I’m pleased that we’ll be able to offer almost all of our customers access to the improved WiFi for free. We know WiFi is a top priority for our customers and I’m sure they’ll welcome the upgrades to both speed and availability.”

• Visit the Virgin Trains website
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