How not to run a franchise

Twelve months ago, Avanti West Coast announced its multimillion-pound investment in the refurbishment of its rolling stock.

I responded at the time that what we preferred as longstanding, suffering ‘customers’ was a punctual, reliable service. A year on, what we have is something that makes the Northern and

TransPennine Express franchises look like benchmark models of success.

I am sitting on the 1520 ex-Euston, which resembles the last train from the apocalypse every seat taken, people sat in the vestibules, others stood in the aisles.

The vehicles themselves (like all except two I have travelled in this

year) have been nowhere near Widnes for a spruce. Even the ones that have been refurbished, rather bizarrely, retain the same dirty, scruffy toilet facilities.

I have spent the past week trying to secure tickets for a leisure journey in three days’ time (with the same operator), only to be met with “sold out” signs online or tickets unavailable at the booking

office. We now have just four trains per hour out of Euston and only one to Manchester, the latter down from the previous 3tph on the busiest route.

Punctuality, even on a reduced service, seems difficult to achieve as even the train I am travelling on arrives late into Manchester.

It is fabulous that the Pendolinos have lasted 20 years and been to

the moon and back several times, but the fact is they are narrow, uncomfortable, and provide a ‘musical’ accompaniment of rattles and vibrations on every journey. From a customer’s perspective, they really aren’t great to travel on and needed a complete internal refurbishment ten years ago.

There are two culprits in this sorry tale: the Department for Transport for taking the franchise away from Virgin in the first place; and, of course, Avanti West Coast itself, which manages to reach a new low in customer service every week.

David Watts, Altrincham