Scotrail

[welshbairn]

1 hour ago, Scary Bear said:

Hallelujah! The 4.34 Edinburgh to Perth Train - the last off-peak service in the evening, and busiest service in Scotland - finally has 3 coaches. If this is a permanent feature then things are looking up.

That’s only taken the various Scotrail operators 10+ years to sort out the difficult process of adding one additional carriage to a service. Celebrate good times, come on! Well done Scotrail!

Someone with more knowledge will say whether Scotrail have control over buying , leasing  or allocation of rolling stock?

Edited January 7, 2019 by welshbairn

[Ginaro]

8 hours ago, jamamafegan said:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-46775079

Seems things are reaching boiling point. Get Abellio to f**k, I want a public railway.

However, Mr Cortes said Scottish passengers deserved better. He added: "Under public ownership not only could ticket prices come down but investment in rolling stock and staff would go up. "A publicly owned ScotRail would reinvest the profits back into running the railway."

Forgetting of course that you can do those things just now but it would cost the taxpayer more money, and that last year Scotrail made a loss had to be loaned £10m from their parent company. Just getting a publicly owned Scotrail to run the service doesn't automatically mean things will be better.

BTW your 30p pish was at a station (Central I assume) run by the nationalised Network Rail - which will be free come April: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-46589824

Edited January 7, 2019 by Ginaro

[Bold Rover]

4 hours ago, JTS98 said:

I was back in Scotland for a few months last year and was genuinely astonished at how bad the trains were.

I travelled frequently between Glasgow and Edinburgh. At least three times a week for various reasons. Weekdays, weekends, mornings, afternoons, evenings.

There was not one week where I didn't have either a cancellation or a significant delay. On one occasion I was sitting on the train to Motherwell from Waverley (three something in the afternoon), which didn't leave on time with no explanation. Then, to the bewilderment of all on board, suddenly the board on the platform indicated that our train was now going somewhere else. No mention of what had happened to the scheduled Motherwell train. No staff around, obviously. Total confusion. I got off the train and went for a pint.

Another day I was waiting for the train to leave Waverley to go to Queen Street when they announced a platform change about two minutes before departure. Dozens of people run round to the new platform and jump onto the train which was sitting with the doors open. It's quite busy, lots of people on board. One guy near me notices that there's nothing on the wee destination screen at the end of the carriage. Spots a staff member walking up the platform so shouts to ask him if this is the Glasgow train. The guy laughs and says no, the Glasgow train is the one further up the platform and ours is going nowhere. This arsepiece could see dozens of people crammed into the carriages, obviously expecting to go to Glasgow, and unless he'd been asked, he wouldn't have bothered his arse to tell us all we were on the wrong train. Incredible. The boy that asked him the question spoke for us all when he said "Thanks for your help, arsehole".

These are the two most memorable occasions, but I think there were only three days where my journey just worked as planned. It was ridiculous. It got to the point where I was deliberately making plans later than necessary because I assumed the trains would let me down. I was usually right.

ETA: Special mention for the day the Glasgow to East Kilbride train dumped everyone out at Clarkston after sitting there for about ten minutes, no explanation given, just told to wait for the next train. Got to the platform to see the next two trains showing as 'cancelled'. I went for a pint then went back to check the board again. Third train also showing as 'cancelled'. I got another pint and got a mate to pick me up.

The trains in Scotland are miles and miles and miles behind the times. Shite service, far too expensive, unhelpful and clearly poorly trained staff. The whole thing needs a complete reboot.

As a regular Scotrail user - I'm on my way home on one of their services right now - my experience isn't quite as negative as that of JTS. All of the above can happen, but it's not with quite that frequency. But the main point with which I take issue is the performance of the Scotrail foot soldiers. I generally find them to be decent and helpful, though sometimes poorly informed, for which I blame their managers.

[welshbairn]

59 minutes ago, Bold Rover said:

As a regular Scotrail user - I'm on my way home on one of their services right now - my experience isn't quite as negative as that of JTS. All of the above can happen, but it's not with quite that frequency. But the main point with which I take issue is the performance of the Scotrail foot soldiers. I generally find them to be decent and helpful, though sometimes poorly informed, for which I blame their managers.

Yeh, I usually travel recreationally and off peak up north and it's very rare to be late, although the far North lines have problems. The staff are usually very helpful about getting the cheapest ticket apart from some officious colonial* bitch on the Inverness Wick line who throws you off for supping a can on the way back from a Brora match.

*Australian or South African, can't remember. It's ok to be bigoted about them, especially when they throw you off a train.

Edited January 7, 2019 by welshbairn

[BallochSonsFan]

It's amazing that state owned railways can deliver the level of service we can only dream about in the UK and yet folk think that nationalising the railways wouldn't work.

 

Tell that to Deutsche Bahn.

[Ginaro]

3 minutes ago, BallochSonsFan said:

It's amazing that state owned railways can deliver the level of service we can only dream about in the UK and yet folk think that nationalising the railways wouldn't work.

Tell that to Deutsche Bahn.

Hardly amazing when they get 3-4 times more subsidy per passenger-km than the UK.

 

[RiG]

Well worth pinging in a wee complaint or two to Scotrail and ask for refunds. I've had numerous disruptions lately that went beyond a simple 30 minute delay claim type refund with trains having no heating, no First Class, bus replacements etc. Long story short - I recently wrote into Scotland  Scotrail respectfully requesting the full refund of my two First Class tickets (only £10 each as I got the advance ones) hoping for around £20 back for the two tickets due to disruption, poor facilities on the train etc.

Scotrail agreed to send me rail vouchers (exchangeable for cash) to cover the cost due to the bad experiences I had had. Bizarrely, another letter appeared giving me another £100 in vouchers which I can also exchange for cash. So I'm not sure how this has happened but after asking for around £20 in refunds they've given me £120  

Based on my experience it's well worth sending them a complaint or two.

Edited January 8, 2019 by RiG

[NJ2]

Well worth pinging in a wee complaint or two to Scotrail and ask for refunds. I've had numerous disruptions lately that went beyond a simple 30 minute delay claim type refund with trains having no heating, no First Class, bus replacements etc. Long story short - I recently wrote into Scotland respectfully requesting the full refund of my two First Class tickets (only £10 each as I got the advance ones) hoping for around £20 back for the two tickets due to disruption, poor facilities on the train etc.

Scotrail agreed to send me rail vouchers (exchangeable for cash) to cover the cost due to the bad experiences I had had. Bizarrely, another letter appeared giving me another £100 in vouchers which I can also exchange for cash. So I'm not sure how this has happened but after asking for around £20 in refunds they've given me £120  

Based on my experience it's well worth sending them a complaint or two.

I had an absolute battle to get a refund from them when their website fucked up and booked me two tickets. If I’m booking in advance, I’ll only book virgin/LNER whatever it is now. Shower of c***s imo but if more folk have tales like yours I’ll revise my opinion in hope for a f**k up!

[Bold Rover]

11 hours ago, welshbairn said:

Yeh, I usually travel recreationally and off peak up north and it's very rare to be late, although the far North lines have problems. The staff are usually very helpful about getting the cheapest ticket apart from some officious colonial* bitch on the Inverness Wick line who throws you off for supping a can on the way back from a Brora match.

*Australian or South African, can't remember. It's ok to be bigoted about them, especially when they throw you off a train.

Really? What are the rules about alcohol on trains? I see it as the norm; indeed an attraction to use the trains.

[The Naitch]

Really? What are the rules about alcohol on trains? I see it as the norm; indeed an attraction to use the trains.

Can’t have booze between 9pm and 10am on Scotrail trains, that’s been the case for years now.

[jamamafegan]

Well worth pinging in a wee complaint or two to Scotrail and ask for refunds. I've had numerous disruptions lately that went beyond a simple 30 minute delay claim type refund with trains having no heating, no First Class, bus replacements etc. Long story short - I recently wrote into Scotland respectfully requesting the full refund of my two First Class tickets (only £10 each as I got the advance ones) hoping for around £20 back for the two tickets due to disruption, poor facilities on the train etc.

Scotrail agreed to send me rail vouchers (exchangeable for cash) to cover the cost due to the bad experiences I had had. Bizarrely, another letter appeared giving me another £100 in vouchers which I can also exchange for cash. So I'm not sure how this has happened but after asking for around £20 in refunds they've given me £120  

Based on my experience it's well worth sending them a complaint or two.

Ooft. Decent. I just put a claim in last night via the claims section on the app after yesterday’s train home was delayed. See what happens.

[Scary Bear]

14 hours ago, welshbairn said:

Someone with more knowledge will say whether Scotrail have control over buying , leasing  or allocation of rolling stock?

Transport Scotland, no less, advised me that allocation of resources was up to Scotrail. This wasn’t a new train, although it was more modern than the previous two carriage 4.34 service.

I don’t want to be too cynical, but a part of me thinks this was a one-off and we’ll be back to the two carriage shitshow before long.

[flyingscot]

8 minutes ago, Scary Bear said:

Transport Scotland, no less, advised me that allocation of resources was up to Scotrail. This wasn’t a new train, although it was more modern than the previous two carriage 4.34 service.

I don’t want to be too cynical, but a part of me thinks this was a one-off and we’ll be back to the two carriage shitshow before long.

Daily allocation is down to the operator. Long term allocation is far more complex and isn't solely down to operator. 

[Scary Bear]

4 minutes ago, flyingscot said:

Daily allocation is down to the operator. Long term allocation is far more complex and isn't solely down to operator. 

This is the response I received from Transport Scotland (October 2016) when I was last moved to write to the Transport Manager re the 4.34 service.

The line about Scotrail using it’s train fleet and resources made me think they were in control of it. If they can’t control whether a single service (the 4.34) has two carriages or three carriages, that doesn’t seem like a good system. I would have thought they would have control over this.

 

[flyingscot]

19 minutes ago, Scary Bear said:

This is the response I received from Transport Scotland (October 2016) when I was last moved to write to the Transport Manager re the 4.34 service.

The line about Scotrail using it’s train fleet and resources made me think they were in control of it. If they can’t control whether a single service (the 4.34) has two carriages or three carriages, that doesn’t seem like a good system. I would have thought they would have control over this.

That letter is pretty much a long winded way of saying what I meant.

Scotrail's operations management controls what units the 4.34 service and any other service has on a daily basis. However they only have so many carriages to go around and it is not within their give to simply go and get more. Long term provision of rolling stock is a much more complex issue involving government and leasing companies, hence the part about the government funding more trains.  The current delays to new stock and  trains going off lease have created huge issues. 

15 hours ago, MEADOWXI said:

Any thought that nationalisation would be a return to the 70s is as stupid as current Abellio management.
Too much has changed for that and public services when accountable work.

The East Coast Main Line has three times be run by the public Direct Rail, each time after a private company has fucked off after making a f**k of the service or the accounts or both.

Every time it has been publicly run it has run at a profit and handed more money to the treasury than the private companies

Virgin Trains East Coast gave more to the treasury in 3 years than publicly owned DOR did in 6 years. That was the problem with the franchise- the payments were too high however there is blame on the DfT too. 

I suspect no government would actually want to be entirely responsible for the railways. It's useful to have the current system of publicly owned but privately run as it lets a private companies management insulate you and 'take the blame' when bad things happen. Can you imagine the government being happy to have all the blame for the current situation on Scotrail? Good way to lose support and create a 'crisis'.

I'm not sure what tangible improvements nationalisation would achieve.

[Salvo Montalbano]

Virgin Trains East Coast gave more to the treasury in 3 years than publicly owned DOR did in 6 years. That was the problem with the franchise- the payments were too high however there is blame on the DfT too. 
I suspect no government would actually want to be entirely responsible for the railways. It's useful to have the current system of publicly owned but privately run as it lets a private companies management insulate you and 'take the blame' when bad things happen. Can you imagine the government being happy to have all the blame for the current situation on Scotrail? Good way to lose support and create a 'crisis'.
I'm not sure what tangible improvements nationalisation would achieve.

Trenitalia, NS, DB, SNCF etc are all state owned but they aren't in a sense controlled by the government - there are also separate (state controlled) infrastructure management firms in Italy, Holland, Germany and France as per EU rules and genuine competition on express routes rather than the pseudo-competition we have in the UK.

[Scary Bear]

6 hours ago, flyingscot said:

That letter is pretty much a long winded way of saying what I meant.

Scotrail's operations management controls what units the 4.34 service and any other service has on a daily basis. However they only have so many carriages to go around and it is not within their give to simply go and get more. Long term provision of rolling stock is a much more complex issue involving government and leasing companies, hence the part about the government funding more trains.  The current delays to new stock and  trains going off lease have created huge issues. 

Virgin Trains East Coast gave more to the treasury in 3 years than publicly owned DOR did in 6 years. That was the problem with the franchise- the payments were too high however there is blame on the DfT too. 

I suspect no government would actually want to be entirely responsible for the railways. It's useful to have the current system of publicly owned but privately run as it lets a private companies management insulate you and 'take the blame' when bad things happen. Can you imagine the government being happy to have all the blame for the current situation on Scotrail? Good way to lose support and create a 'crisis'.

I'm not sure what tangible improvements nationalisation would achieve.

My point is really that deciding to put 3 carriages rather than 2 on the busiest train in Scotland - officially according to a Transport Scotland report - shouldn’t be too hard. Just swap a 3 carriage one for a two carriage one on a less busy route. Job done.

I appreciate that buying/leasing new rolling stock will take a bit longer. However, in 2016 I was informed there would be a revolution in rail from 2018 onwards. I eagerly await the revolution and the 20,000 extra seats.

Edited January 8, 2019 by Scary Bear

[ajwffc]

32 minutes ago, Scary Bear said:

My point is really that deciding to put 3 carriages rather than 2 on the busiest train in Scotland - officially according to a Transport Scotland report - shouldn’t be too hard. Just swap a 3 carriage one for a two carriage one on a less busy route. Job done.

 

Not as easy as just swapping a 3 car unit(class 170) with a 2 car one(class 156 or 158) as they have to make sure. That all members of train crew are trained to use that unit for it's daily diagram, it is cleared to run on all the routes and it can end the day at a depot that can service it (refuel, empty the cet tanks, top up with water and fix any faults) 

[Boghead ranter]

5 minutes ago, ajwffc said:

Not as easy as just swapping a 3 car unit(class 170) with a 2 car one(class 156 or 158) as they have to make sure. That all members of train crew are trained to use that unit for it's daily diagram, it is cleared to run on all the routes and it can end the day at a depot that can service it (refuel, empty the cet tanks, top up with water and fix any faults) 

Whatever happened to carriages with doors that open, windows that sometimes open (sometimes don't shut), and seats that may or may not be soaked in strange substances?

It's PC gone mad, I tell ya. Mad.

[jamamafegan]

Tonights train hasn’t been cancelled but part of me wishes it was - only two carriages on this Glasgow to Dundee service, a train which normally has at least 4 carriages and is always full. Luckily I have managed to secure a seat in the luggage rack, my butt cheeks wedged between the bars.