Cycle reservations - Frome to Westbury

[whole diary]

[grahame]

I was approach by a worried cyclist headed out from Westbury to Frome this morning ... he's fine on his way to Frome in the mornings on a 'unit' but sometimes comes back on the HST^▸ (High Speed Train) and he's been having trouble making an online reservation - I said I would try it out for him.

It looks to me as if Bicycle reservations come up as part of the seat reservation system, but the service he wants to travel on doesn't offer seat reservations ... so what should he do?   I got this rather interesting screen which told me to click on the "bicycle space" link "on this form" but I couldn't see the link.



And, yes, I did scroll down to look for it too!

[Ollie]

For some reason it's not got any quota on it, if I was guessing I'd say it's possibly overlooked because it's an HST^▸ (High Speed Train) that is just doing Frome to Westbury as a timetable service, I'll ask the reservations team to take a look tomorrow.

[grahame]

For some reason it's not got any quota on it, if I was guessing I'd say it's possibly overlooked because it's an HST^▸ (High Speed Train) that is just doing Frome to Westbury as a timetable service, I'll ask the reservations team to take a look tomorrow.

Many thanks ... I can't imagine that the train would be heavily booked.

More general question. If there is a train with no quota for cycles (or fully booked ?), is "Bicycle reservations available" and the rest of the text in that green box appropriate. Does the booking engine say "sorry - cycle spaces all booked" (and does it say so early enough in the booking process for cyclist to know before they add a ticket to their basket?

[Ollie]

The lack of reservations is intentional, although operated by an HST^▸ (High Speed Train) it is basically a West service so reservations haven't been added. I have however asked that this be looked into for the sake of consistency with the policy.

Services that do have reservations on board, will get the option on the page on your screenshot, when options are selected and you click to proceed, it will let you know if any of the options could not be met.

[grahame]

The lack of reservations is intentional, although operated by an HST^▸ (High Speed Train) it is basically a West service so reservations haven't been added. I have however asked that this be looked into for the sake of consistency with the policy.

Much appreciated - from a public viewpoint it looks as if you can't get a reservation to take a cycle on this train - so it's "no cycles". I would suspect that if you turned up with a cycle the train manager would accommodate you ...

Totally agree it should be consistent for customers so they know where they stand. 

[Ollie]

So, I've had a nice chat with one of the people involved in this policy, and we're going to look at making the train "counted place" in the reservations system so that bikes can be booked on the service. I don't know how long that will take, as reservations team will have to load the relevant data into NRS. In the meantime I suggest just boarding the train as normal.

[JayMac]

In the meantime I suggest just boarding the train as normal.

Until you get a TM^‡(resolve) who insists that HST^▸ (High Speed Train) operated services require a mandatory reservation. I trust TM's will be briefed.

Ollie you might like to have a further nice chat with those responsible for the policy about the 0706 NTA^» (Newton Abbott - next trains)-PGN, the 2131 PGN-NTA, the 0915 RDG^‡(resolve)-PAD^» (Paddington (London) - next trains)... Three more HST operated services that won't take cycle reservations. There could be more but it isn't my job to find the bugs in the system. That should have been done by the nice people implementing the new policy, before said policy went live. 

[BandHcommuter]

Coach A, where the cycle spaces are located, is not on the platform at Frome for the 2015 departure (unless the train is in reverse formation). There are rarely more than a dozen passengers boarding, maybe one or two with cycles. The train is the return working of the 1805 Paddington to Frome which I use regularly. Passengers with cycles customarily have to locate them in one of the door vestibule areas for the short journey to Westbury, so I would hope that a common sense approach would apply regarding cycle reservation enforcement.

[Ollie]

In the meantime I suggest just boarding the train as normal.

Until you get a TM^‡(resolve) who insists that HST^▸ (High Speed Train) operated services require a mandatory reservation. I trust TM's will be briefed.

Ollie you might like to have a further nice chat with those responsible for the policy about the 0706 NTA^» (Newton Abbott - next trains)-PGN, the 2131 PGN-NTA, the 0915 RDG^‡(resolve)-PAD^» (Paddington (London) - next trains)... Three more HST operated services that won't take cycle reservations. There could be more but it isn't my job to find the bugs in the system. That should have been done by the nice people implementing the new policy, before said policy went live. 

Those are known, and along with the 2015, it's being looked at in regard to best way to keep them in line with policy.