Lost Property Shambles!

[whole diary]

[EBrown]

The person who replied to me on twitter was "Alex". Does anyone know if he's from Serco or the in-house FGW^▸ (First Great Western) team?

Given Ollie has stated he is the only directly employed tweeter, that would make:
Jess, Reg, Paul, Dan, Alex, Toni & John (may have missed some, my memory is not what it used to be) all Serco staff.

So Ollie, do they work at Plymouth because Jess told me she works from there?

[Southern Stag]

Plymouth was the location of the old FGW^▸ (First Great Western) in-house customer service department. They also handled, and possibly still do handle customer service work for other TOCs^▸ (Train Operating Company), both First and non-First. I believe East Coast customer service is based at Plymouth for example.

[Ollie]

The person who replied to me on twitter was "Alex". Does anyone know if he's from Serco or the in-house FGW^▸ (First Great Western) team?

Given Ollie has stated he is the only directly employed tweeter, that would make:
Jess, Reg, Paul, Dan, Alex, Toni & John (may have missed some, my memory is not what it used to be) all Serco staff.

So Ollie, do they work at Plymouth because Jess told me she works from there?

Yep they are in Plymouth

[Tim K]

I had a similar experience recently when I left my season ticket on the train on the way home. The lost property call centre was worse than useless.

Fortunately I retrieved the situation by popping down to the station 3 hours later when the same set was on its way back to London, the TM^‡(resolve) let me board to have a look for it, and the ticket had been handed in to the catering crew. Phew!

If you left your ticket in coach C on the 18:15 London Paddington towards Reading on Friday (16-Nov) then it was me who handed in the ticket to the catering crew!

Tim

[John R]

No, it was on the 1730 Paddington to Taunton a few days earlier, but I'm sure there is an equally careless commuter somewhere who will soon be appreciative of your action, (at least once the ticket works its way through the system!).

[LiskeardRich]

A bit of google brings up 01752 835777 for lost property. I'm assuming this goes to Plymouth rather than India, not sure if this will be any more fruitful.

The call centre doesnt need to call Bristol though, All items are electronically logged on a database, and they just type in a full description and it either brings up a yes or no. I'm sure I read this somewhere on this forum before possibly posted by CfN or BNM

[GaryM]

It's the typing of the full description to search the database for a lost item which is where the problem is when there are clearly some communication issues.

The frustration I have is that when describing the lost keys to the Indian call centre operators, on all occasions I've had to repeat what I'm telling them to try and make them understand the description I'm giving. So you can probably appreciate why I've now lost all confidence that they've fully understood my description and why I no longer trust that any search criteria they might be typing into the computer acurately reflects what I've told them or is even spelt correctly which is what a computer system relies on to find data being asked for.

It therefore seems the only way to get peace of mind that the inventory is being searched correctly is by speaking to someone on the ground in the Bristol office where there will be no communication issues, but as this clearly can't be done by phone, the only way is to visit in person which for a majority of people will be a massive inconvienience in terms of time and cost. Maybe FGW^▸ (First Great Western) would like to offer me a free return ticket to Bristol so I can do this without being out of pocket.

Thanks for posting the 01752 number. I'll give it a try but I'm guessing I will probably just be told to call the main FGW lost property line.

[inspector_blakey]

In the interests of generating a bit of debate, I'm going to offer another point of view on this situation. Lost property is a nightmare for train companies to deal with, and for every item that is being earnestly looked for there will be many more that simply moulder in a lost property office somewhere until the company has to dispose of them one way or another. All of this costs money which could, arguably, be spent on improving the train service itself.

I have lost items on the railway myself: on one occasion I did manage to retrieve it through a TOC^▸ (Train Operating Company) lost property office. On the others I didn't. However on each occasion I took the attitude that it was my own stupid fault that I had left things behind, and whilst I was grateful if the train company was able to assist I also realized that they owed me nothing if they weren't able to.

On a couple of occasions in the last few months I have experienced at first hand some customers who seemed to think it was perfectly acceptable to give me grief and behave obnoxiously because they had lost something that had not subsequently been turned in to lost property: there seemed to be very little concept of personal responsibility. Whilst I'm not suggesting that this was the case in the situation under discussion, lost property can be a much bigger source of conflict for front-line staff than your average customer might realize.

[ellendune]

In the interests of generating a bit of debate, I'm going to offer another point of view on this situation. Lost property is a nightmare for train companies to deal with, and for every item that is being earnestly looked for there will be many more that simply moulder in a lost property office somewhere until the company has to dispose of them one way or another. All of this costs money which could, arguably, be spent on improving the train service itself.

Of course it will moulder in some lost property office somewhere if the owner cannot find out if it has been handed in there. Also they do (not unreasonably) charge for retruning lost property so the cost argument should not apply.

On a couple of occasions in the last few months I have experienced at first hand some customers who seemed to think it was perfectly acceptable to give me grief and behave obnoxiously because they had lost something that had not subsequently been turned in to lost property: there seemed to be very little concept of personal responsibility. Whilst I'm not suggesting that this was the case in the situation under discussion, lost property can be a much bigger source of conflict for front-line staff than your average customer might realize.

Yes but that is a long way from making it virtually impossible to get it back without making a journey to Bristol on the off-chance that it might be there.

We may bemoan that passengers are now called customers, but I am affraid this is yet another example that we still need a sea change in the attitude of the railway to dealing with its customers. What other industries call 'customer service'.   

[IndustryInsider]

We may bemoan that passengers are now called customers, but I am affraid this is yet another example that we still need a sea change in the attitude of the railway to dealing with its customers. What other industries call 'customer service'.   

I agree with many of your points, but I'm not so sure other industries are quite so different.  In my dealings with many different companies representing many different industries over the years, it seems that as soon as you want to do something slightly out of the ordinary it is very hard to sort it out and the end result is often frustration with an Indian call centre clerk who can't help.

Lost property is an awkward one.  Most people losing a set of keys wouldn't bother to chase them up as they will have spares, many other items are insignificant like umbrellas, then you get the valuables and sentimental items that would mean the world to the owner if they were to be reunited with them.  Having a central office is probably better than having to phone round lots of different stations/offices like you used to have to do, though perhaps having a direct dial telephone number to it (specifically for lost property only) would certainly be better than facing the experience Gary has.

[Ollie]

The only issue I can think of for having a direct number through to Lost Property at Bristol is you would then need more staff in place in order to deal with an increased volume of calls and still continue running of the office the front counter and updating the database.

Not sure if any of my colleagues know how many staff are actually on duty in lost property at Bristol at any given time?

[ellendune]

I agree with many of your points, but I'm not so sure other industries are quite so different.  In my dealings with many different companies representing many different industries over the years, it seems that as soon as you want to do something slightly out of the ordinary it is very hard to sort it out and the end result is often frustration with an Indian call centre clerk who can't help.

I agree, some companies, particulalrly UK^▸ (United Kingdom) companies are starting to compete with the ofshore production by doing customer service better and responsing to the request for the out of the ordinary.

I guess that while train companies have problems of overcrowding rather than a need to fill empty seats there is little incentive to improve customer service.

Lost property is an awkward one.  Most people losing a set of keys wouldn't bother to chase them up as they will have spares, many other items are insignificant like umbrellas, then you get the valuables and sentimental items that would mean the world to the owner if they were to be reunited with them.  Having a central office is probably better than having to phone round lots of different stations/offices like you used to have to do, though perhaps having a direct dial telephone number to it (specifically for lost property only) would certainly be better than facing the experience Gary has.

I agree a central office is probably the best option, but the quid pro quo is you have to provide good communications so that people can find out if their property is there!

Many years ago I left my wallet on a train, and the first I knew was when a railway lost property person rang saying that it  had been found and would I like them to send it to my local station where could collect it from the parcels office after a certain time.  There are various reasons why this would be difficult now (not least the end of the parcels business).  But it was good customer service.

[GaryM]

For future reference, the 01752 20835777 phone number no longer works so the offshore call centre is the only line of communication.

Most of the lost keys on the ring aren't particularly important and could easily be replaced at little cost, however the two car keys are going to cost the best part of ^400 to replace and get cut/coded to the cars so understandably my parents don't really want to fork out this kind of money until they are absolutely sure the keys aren't sitting in the Bristol lost property office which is now going to require a personal visit by someone to ascertain this.

To add to the discussion in the previous few posts, I don't think a direct line to the lost property office is necessary but certainly a UK^▸ (United Kingdom) based call centre where there is going to be no or little communication issues and where you at least feel reassured that they have tried to do their best to correctly search the inventory. Something that certainly hasn't been the case with the offshore call centre in this particular instance.

[Chris from Nailsea]

The offer is still there, GaryM: send me a PM with the details if you'd like me to call in on them at BRI^» (Bristol Temple Meads - next trains).

[thetrout]

Isn't there a big flaw with typing in a description to a Database though?

Surely it's only as good as the person who's made the "found" log in the first place? Whilst I don't want to go down the What If's route. Surely it is plausible that some staff for whatever reason haven't listed all the details. Like for example:

Black Laptop Case - Contains Brown Laptop - 15" screen - Assorted Papers

Black Laptop Case with Shoulder Strap, Damaged side clip, HP ProBook 4520s Laptop with damaged bottom panel - Serial No: 1C97PADPLY, Bank Statement and Insurance Documents, Pack of Spearmint Soft Mints, Suspicious looking magazine with fruity images

Now a Brown Laptop could be one of hundreds. Also the staff might put in 16" screen (which are in circulation on some models) But if the actual TFT part is 15" or 15.4" or 15.6" then those should be correct measurements recorded retrospectively. A Staff Member may not have been aware of this.

So, could I be right in saying an accurate description from the property owner could cause a false-positive when FGW^▸ (First Great Western) may have actually retrieved the bag with, laptop and porn mag?

Incidentally one of my friends lost his wallet on the train last Friday. He has also had the pains of trying to deal with the Indian Call centre who keep telling him to "Call Back Tomorrow". They also couldn't grasp that he had a 10 Trillion Dollar note inside siting that no money exists. 1) He found it on the floor a few years ago. 2) Such money does exist in Zimbabwe

Perhaps Gary's issue isn't as uncommon as we'd want to believe?

Not in the lighter side, but did anyone spot what I did there?