The BBC's Simon Montague: "These are complaints not dealt with satisfactorily by the rail companies themselves"

The number of complaints made by travellers rose by 27% last year, with reliability, punctuality and overcrowding topping the list of moans.

The Central Rail Users Consultative Committee said passengers were continuing to suffer under the privatised network - with punctuality deteriorating on two-thirds of routes.

Richard Branson's Virgin CrossCountry service has punctuality problems

Chairman David Bertram said: "These figures show how far there is still to go and it is a mystery why some operators can habitually put in a good performance and others seem helpless to improve.

"They show just how far some operators still have to go to meet passengers' legitimate expectations. Until they do that, it is not surprising if complaints go up."

Overall, complaints about reliability rose by 42%, punctuality by 38% and overcrowding by 36%.

The biggest cause of dissatisfaction was punctuality, making up 21% of complaints.

£1bn on new trains

Virgin CrossCountry was singled out by the CRUCC as being among the worst performing operators.

Virgin saw 20.3% of its trains delayed, compared with a national average of 9.3%.

But a company spokesman defended the service, saying the nature of the routes operated - from Penzance in the south to Aberdeen in Scotland - made it disproportionately liable to delays.

The spokesman added that £1bn was being spent on new trains.

But North West Trains, which operates in the south Manchester area, declined to comment on its 69% increase in the number of services arriving late.

The CRUCC is where customers can take their grievance after they have complained to the rail company in the first instance.

Inquiry line improves

Last year the watchdog recorded a significant rise in the number of complaints received, at 18,771.

But there was some good news as it revealed that complaints about the National Rail Enquiries telephone information service fell by almost a third.

The Association of Train Operating Companies welcomed the drop in complaints over the NRE phoneline.

Director George Muir said: "We are encouraged by the latest statistics from CRUCC showing that the efforts made to improve the telephone enquiry service are bearing fruit.

"Complaints generally are still too high. Train operators are installing customer information systems or help buttons at every station, spending £39m on security, closed-circuit televisions and improved lighting.