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Author Topic: Shortage of train crews on Great Western Railway since September 2017 - ongoing discussion  (Read 424643 times)
martyjon
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« Reply #435 on: February 18, 2018, 06:14:49 »

06:15 and not one cancellation, short working or short formation on journeycheck, perhaps there's a shortage of trained IT staff today, give it an hour or two.
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grahame
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« Reply #436 on: February 18, 2018, 07:38:21 »

If you have ever been in a position where you were being blamed for not being able do something that is totally outside your control then you should understand the effect of your criticism. 

Well said ... and (yes) that's the position that so many of the GWR (Great Western Railway) team find themselves in - at whatever level we can (or cannot) pin blame for the failure to deliver a service to specified reliability on the GWR corporate / what level of realistic choice they have.

January in my neck of the woods was a breath of fresh air in terms of service improvement.  The last fortnight, alas, the wheel seems to have fallen off the wagon again with faulty and unfit rolling stock, lack of train crew and infrastructure problems all contributing to on-the-day cancellations on a virtually daily basis, with a sprinkling of planned engineering changes at weekend to put off the timid new customer even more.   But only rarely can I blame the people on the team I come across in any way; typically the opposite, with them going out of their way to provide help as best they can to the customers caught up in this.
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Timmer
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« Reply #437 on: February 18, 2018, 07:58:48 »

06:15 and not one cancellation, short working or short formation on journeycheck, perhaps there's a shortage of trained IT staff today, give it an hour or two.
Sadly not, 3 have appeared at the time of writing and it’s on the one route that cannot afford cancellations due to engineering work already making the journey between South Wales and London more of a challenge. Imagine getting on a train at Swansea, getting off at Cardiff onto a bus to arrive at Newport to find your connection to London cancelled. It happened yesterday and is happening again today
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ellendune
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« Reply #438 on: February 18, 2018, 08:35:11 »

Sorry.  I understand where you are coming from but if you are aware that things will go pear shaped you should do the following in advance:

- Beef up your customer service team and make them highly responsive
- Do not launch a major advertising campaign when you know you will have problems delivering the expectations you have raised
- Set up contingency plans.  In this case planned contracted road transport that can quickly slot into place.
- Agree with your sponsor that you will explain the problems, apologise for them and make OTT (Open Train Times website) payments in compensation

If you have done this then you can genuinely claim that you foresaw the problem and planned to mitigate the issues.


Now that I can agree with.  All that is within GWR (Great Western Railway)'s control corporately.  However remember it is seldom within the control of the staff we meet.   
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TaplowGreen
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« Reply #439 on: February 18, 2018, 08:57:34 »

Sorry.  I understand where you are coming from but if you are aware that things will go pear shaped you should do the following in advance:

- Beef up your customer service team and make them highly responsive
- Do not launch a major advertising campaign when you know you will have problems delivering the expectations you have raised
- Set up contingency plans.  In this case planned contracted road transport that can quickly slot into place.
- Agree with your sponsor that you will explain the problems, apologise for them and make OTT (Open Train Times website) payments in compensation

If you have done this then you can genuinely claim that you foresaw the problem and planned to mitigate the issues.


Now that I can agree with.  All that is within GWR (Great Western Railway)'s control corporately.  However remember it is seldom within the control of the staff we meet.   

I would very much doubt that anyone holds Bob in the ticket office responsible for the systemic problems alluded to above which the Senior Management of GWR have brought upon themselves, and their frontline staff who have to deal with the consequences.

The four bullet points which exPassenger provides are excellent examples of the shortcomings and oversights which have brought us to where we are now, and had these been considered it's entirely possible things would be calmer - particularly when it comes to a Business promising things which it knows it cannot deliver, with shiny, expensive and facile advertising campaigns

The time is now ripe for Hopwood to emerge from the bunker stand up and publicly give details of the recovery plan with lessons learned, realistic outcomes and datelines - if it means an emergency timetable for a short time, well that would be better than the utter chaos we saw yesterday, and see in the Cotswolds on a daily basis.

It's called Leadership and accountability, and many of us in service industries who have been in the position which ellendune rhetorically described have learned that the latter is the one thing that cannot be delegated if you wish to be considered worthy of the former - it's perhaps time for Hopwood to demonstrate to his customers that he understands that principle.
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IndustryInsider
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« Reply #440 on: February 18, 2018, 12:09:52 »

"until the new trains ordered by DfT» (Department for Transport - about) work reliably"

Do I surmise from the above quote that the new trains are NOT working reliably ? I thought that the general view was that they are splendid and that only a few naysayers and old dinosaurs like me dared to express doubts about reliability.

Yes, I did.
Can not find the post in order to quote it, but I said something like "Diesel engines and electric drives are mature technologies and should hopefully work reasonably reliably. The problems IMHO (in my humble opinion) are likely to be with computers and software. Unlike mechanical components, software is NEVER a mature technology, "if it works it must be obsolete"
The new DMUs (Diesel Multiple Unit) are likely to contain a large number of computer systems, all of which have to work together, first time every time"

In other posts I also expressed doubts as to electrification being completed on time, and about the reliability of the electrification equipment. I specifically forecast that a single pigeon could cause widespread disruption.

A couple of points are worth mentioning I think.

Overall, the reliability of the new electrification equipment has been pretty good in my opinion.  I can't recall any major 'wires down' incidents that would no doubt have crippled the service a couple of times by now if we had the cheap system as installed on the ECML (East Coast Main Line).  The pigeon incident occurred at West Ealing, so that's on the part of the route that has been electrified for 20 years and could have happened at any time since then.  IIUI it was more to do with the poor condition of masonry on the underside of the bridge rather than anything else, and the increased clearances between wires and bridge that the newly electrified sections have should make it much less likely to happen there.  Headspan wires are largely being removed where they were installed originally between Airport Junction and Paddington, however the low clearances under bridges will not be altered (the cost would be huge), so I guess there remains a risk on the old sections of electrification.

Regarding the new train reliability, I think by and large they are settling in quite well, if by no means perfectly.  There have been too many ADD (Automatic Dropping Device) incidents, particularly with the 387s, but otherwise many of the delays can be attributed to staff familiarisation as much as anything else.  Drivers who had driven Turbos or HSTs (High Speed Train) for decades knew how to remedy most faults quickly as they had experienced them many times before, but on the new trains there are new/different faults with new/different remedies so fault finding and resolution understandably takes longer.

Launch day embarrassment aside I can only think of one major incident involving an IET (Intercity Express Train), which was the one at Hayes & Harlington on 21st December (which was indeed a big one!).  Sure there's been plenty of more minor delays and cancellations, but I think it's right to point out that there's been two high-profile HST failures more recently - the one outside Paddington on Feb 8th as well as the massive disruption caused last Friday when the HST sat down near Westbury. 

The new trains are likely to get more reliable over time, the old trains are likely to get less reliable.
« Last Edit: February 18, 2018, 12:53:18 by IndustryInsider » Logged

To view my GWML (Great Western Main Line) Electrification cab video 'before and after' video comparison, as well as other videos of the new layout at Reading and 'before and after' comparisons of the Cotswold Line Redoubling scheme, see: http://www.dailymotion.com/user/IndustryInsider/
TaplowGreen
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« Reply #441 on: February 23, 2018, 17:04:12 »

After the chaos on services to/from Wales last weekend due to staff shortages, I'd hope that GWR (Great Western Railway) have sorted themselves out for this weekend, especially with a 6 Nations match at Cardiff tomorrow with all the extra traffic that entails?
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phile
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« Reply #442 on: February 23, 2018, 17:07:17 »

After the chaos on services to/from Wales last weekend due to staff shortages, I'd hope that GWR (Great Western Railway) have sorted themselves out for this weekend, especially with a 6 Nations match at Cardiff tomorrow with all the extra traffic that entails?

Wales 6 Nations match tomorrow is in Dublin
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TaplowGreen
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« Reply #443 on: February 23, 2018, 17:31:56 »

After the chaos on services to/from Wales last weekend due to staff shortages, I'd hope that GWR (Great Western Railway) have sorted themselves out for this weekend, especially with a 6 Nations match at Cardiff tomorrow with all the extra traffic that entails?

Wales 6 Nations match tomorrow is in Dublin

You're right! Doh! I'll get my coat!🙈🙊
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Timmer
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« Reply #444 on: February 23, 2018, 18:40:34 »

Let’s hope it’s a better weekend for all those travelling GWR (Great Western Railway) than it was last weekend.
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Timmer
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« Reply #445 on: February 24, 2018, 06:14:08 »

Another day of service excellence from Rail Business of the Year during the Saturday ‘evening peak’.

So far we have...

Both the 17.00 and 17.30 London-Bristol/Weston services cancelled. So it’s either the 16.30 or 18.00 which will be cosy so no worries about being cold with plenty of close up shared bodily warmth. All part of the service from our Rail Business of the Year.

Worse if you are heading TO London from Bristol/Bath/Chippenham this evening as both return journeys are also cancelled so nothing between 18.30 and 21.47 from Bristol TM(resolve).

To top it off on the London-Bristol line, the last direct train of the day for Chippenham/Bath/Bristol TM from London, the 21.32 is also cancelled so miss the 20.30 you are gonna be in for a late evening involving a rail replacement bus.

South Wales passengers aren’t going to get away with it entirely either with the 16.45 Padd-Swansea train terminating at Bristol Parkway. But a huge improvement on last Saturday.

Two cancellations so far on North Cotswold line:
5.18 Padd-Great Malvern. Okay unfortunate but means the 8.43 return to London is canned.
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IndustryInsider
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« Reply #446 on: February 24, 2018, 07:36:57 »

The next Cotswold Line train after that one also cancelled from Oxford.
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Timmer
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« Reply #447 on: February 24, 2018, 15:19:38 »

Pleased to report that the 17.00 Pad-Bristol, 20.09 WSM-Pad and 21.32 Pad-Bristol have all been removed from the cancellations list so can assume crew were found and that they are now running which will be good for those travelling this evening on this line.

Edit to say 20.09 WSM starts at Bristol TM(resolve) and will also convey passengers on the diverted 18.29 Swansea-Pad which terminates at Bristol TM due to crew issues.
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CyclingSid
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« Reply #448 on: February 24, 2018, 18:58:54 »

This morning Reading - Paddington service, calling at Slough, depart Reading 10:57 (from Gt Malvern) cancelled due to crew shortage
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phile
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« Reply #449 on: February 24, 2018, 19:27:29 »

Already posted three posts back
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