ARE YOU REALLY BEING SERVED...?
Railway passengers are also customers, yet parts of the rail sector believe customers do not need to understand the reasons behind service failure. At a time of disruption, the rail industry trots out jargon-riddled or bland excuses, often using inane phr
There have been unprecedented levels of capital investment in upgrading, enhancing and in some cases building new infrastructure, along with the doubling of annual railway passenger journeys since 1997. A further 3% growth for 2018/19 has just been reported, so the demand on our railways keeps growing.
Privately-managed franchises providing customer service on a state-owned network, with sustainability in place through electrification on some main routes and readily achievable elsewhere, along with high-speed connectivity based and exemplary safety – what an opportunity!
Yet, it’s a sector where far too many customers regularly receive an unsatisfactory experience. There seems to be no effective regulation that ensures customer service through meaningful measures. Poor engagement and indifference with passengers too often creates a negative customer experience of ‘the railway’.
Such problems are reflected in the evidence gathered as part of the Rail Review the Government asked former BA chairman Keith Williams to undertake:
“The railway is simply unreliable, especially for time-critical journeys. Passenger frustration was particularly acute about events which are seen to be in the operators’ control, for example, the failure of staff to show up for work. Add into this, a perception of high fares plus a complex rail fares system and passengers feel that they are not getting value for money or even being offered the best value fare. Its small wonder that passengers can think so negatively about train travel.”
KEITH WILLIAMS
Most passengers don’t have the deep level of understanding about railways those who work in the industry or indeed readers of The RM may have. For those with railway knowledge, it is too easy to write off a whole range of service failures because they are minor, and because you and I know the reason for it. To appreciate this, it’s helpful to go outside the world of the railway for a moment.
Imagine yourself at a supermarket. The car
park is often full, and you can’t get parked, there aren’t enough trolleys, there are gaps on the shelves where you are expected to find branded items. Other items don’t appear to be priced or have a price on the shelves that is different from what the checkouts show. Then, there are no bags to put your groceries in. Would you keep shopping at this place, and would the supermarket just let this slide? If they did, they’d go out of business.
Back to our railways, where passengers
(who let’s not forget ARE those supermarket customers) are often expected to pay expensive car park charges or simply can’t find a parking space. Automatic ticket machines that offer a much more expensive ticket than a cheaper ‘bestvalue’ ticket for the same journey.
Frequent delays or being stranded for hours by train services that have been cancelled because of staff shortages. Travelling on an overcrowded train with no available seat or paying for First Class service that’s not present or just offers of a meagre snack. Putting up with mediocre or no communication about service problems and solutions; unpunctual services because of sub-optimal infrastructure; or skipping station calls to hit performance targets – and then there’s the industrial disputes.
Patience exhausted
Increasing numbers of passengers are finding their patience is exhausted because they are increasingly being expected to fork out more money for train fares, coupled with the unreliability of some operators, which are ineffective or indifferent when it comes to passenger communication. Where this exists it’s hardly surprising some passengers are finding alternative means of travel. Unfortunately, these are seldom options that help reduce carbon emissions.
The system of passenger services being operated by a franchise has become a ‘lucky dip’, with few passengers able to pick a winner.
Constant meddling and micro-management by the Department for Transport has often prevented competition and stifled innovation. Apart from a couple of notable exceptions, franchising has meant copious amounts of passenger-, and indeed train-operator frustration.
Repeatedly awarded best train operator, Chiltern Railways had the benefit of a 25-year franchise, and was initially led by career railway managers with vision and a depth of railway knowledge. They successfully planned, managed and delivered better customer experience based on short-, medium- and long-term outcomes involving all aspects, including infrastructure renewals and expansion by working closely with Network Rail. Lessons run deep here because Chiltern, which like Northern is now owned by Arriva, is still one of the most customer-focused, and considered one of the better train operators, and one that through its planned vision has grown passenger numbers significantly.
Central Trains (1997-2007), which became London Midland (until December 2017) and is now West Midlands Railways, is a different story. The dependency on voluntary overtime and rest day working goes back decades and has never been properly resolved. It has been further compounded by annual leave and sickness
absence. Engagement with the Trade Unions and the negotiation of new terms and conditions to avoid a reliance on overtime and rest days as well as better management of absence should have been a top priority in any plan of the past franchisees. Indeed the incumbent had the advantage of historic knowledge of previous industrial disputes when compiling its bid.
Yet, in December 2019 the scale of unreliability caused by crew shortages because of disproportionate annual leave, a lack of volunteers for overtime or a willingness to work rest days, reached unprecedented levels, causing the West Midlands Metro (WMR) Mayor Andy Street to threaten to request the DfT to take the franchise off WMR.
Brand damage
Unlike Northern and TPE, which face similar staffing and crew-training issues, there are fewer infrastructure issues for WMR. Procuring new trains for overcrowded services, and a timetable that turned out to be too ambitious, are not necessarily mistakes, but where were train crew resources, service reliability and new terms and conditions in WMR’s planned outcomes?
The consequential brand damage to
WMR and more widely ‘the railways’ has been significant and embarrassing, with the BBC Midlands presenter Nick Owen stating on TV in January: “WMR had one job to do, so why was it so hard for them to do it?”
I applaud the efforts and long hours worked by some loyal and customer committed WMT front line managers and staff to keep as many services running as possible.
On January 13, WMT managing director Jan Chaudhry-van der Velde resigned.
Countless examples of companies across a range of sectors have demonstrated that setting a framework and financials that transcend everything else is not sustainable. Simply, if you don’t build or develop your assets to deliver the required outcome then you will fail. It’s a lesson not learnt by some TOCs and repeatedly missed by the DfT in the bidding and agreement stages of franchise competitions. Just look at page 7 of this issue to see the latest story of several franchises facing difficulties. Despite promises of lessons being learnt, they are clearly not.
The model of Privatisation that John Major’s Government imposed in 1994 sought to deliver excellent customer experience. In reality, it increased operating costs within the sector, with an army of people needed to run the 170 or so different reasons for ‘attribution of delay’, which over a year sees millions of pounds move around the sector to offset costs of delays with absolutely no tangible benefit to the passenger.
Delayed passengers are entitled to claim a partial or, in severe delay cases, a full refund, but many don’t because the process is perceived as ‘too difficult’. However, in fairness several franchisees have delivered significant service improvements for passengers.
Can one say the railways have ever been thoroughly privatised? The Act of Parliament that sought to denationalise the railway gave the DfT too much of a continuing role. This often led to franchisees with ideas and schemes having them stamped out for fear they might delivering too much innovation and improvement.
While vertical integration of the sector would address some issues, and is undoubtedly much in fashion, I caution those who see this as another ‘silver bullet’. The Chiltern experience demonstrates it’s much more to do with planning outcomes and the crucial element of all parties working together to deliver. In essence, it’s down to the people, trust, leadership and drive to succeed, which is sadly lacking in many industries, including rail.
Bungled handling
Just look at the bungled handling of the CrossCountry (XC) franchise renewal, suspended in September 2018, and for which the DfT held a public consultation, but to date has never published any results. It’s now February 2020 and there is still no news on the future of the franchise in respect of a direct award (with hopefully additional rolling stock), or if it will be re-tendered following the Williams review.
How many years has the DfT known about the Persons with Reduced Mobility (PRM) legislation that came into force at the beginning of 2020? And how many years has the DfT known about overcrowding on XC services?
Yet, we have last minute derogations being made because of non-compliance with PRM. One idea presented by the DfT during the XC franchise consultation was to choke off passenger demand for XC services in peak hours by not stopping trains! Where did they think the
‘choked off’ passengers concerned were going to go? Do you know of a supermarket that seeks to choke off demand rather than find ways to serve it?
Throughout this time, we have seen many IC125 sets go of off-lease to languish in sidings as XC passengers continue to board trains daily, where they can’t get a seat, and at times struggle to even to get on and clear of the train doors. Representations to the DfT by MPs and petitions have been ignored, with the DfT sitting on their hands. Imagine, a rolling programme of cascaded IC125s going in for PRM and toilet-retention tank fitting, addressing the XC overcrowding issues and indeed the ‘seawater allergic’ ‘Voyager’ issue on services through South Devon. Such daily negative passenger experiences could have been avoided by someone with common sense, tenacity and the ability to make a decision.
‘Voyagers’ could have been redeployed on Cardiff to Nottingham and Birmingham to Stansted services, resolving Class 170 overcrowding in the medium term until new rolling stock was introduced as part of the new franchise.
What value does the DfT actually add because across the network they have not acted on overcrowding or poorly performing TOCs? Many issues abound and the DfT appear to be lacking, static and either unwilling or unable to make decisions.
Only now, after months of pain for the travelling public, has Northern been put on notice, and there are possibly four other train operators that could be taken over by an Operator of Last Resort for the DfT.
If the Prime Minister’s key advisor Dominic Cummings wants to make his mark by shaking up the corridors of power and bringing in people that know about subjects with depth and have the ability to get things done, the DfT and
“Twitter is one of the most popular SM (social media) channels for passenger information, and LNER are excellent in using it as an effective communication channel.”
railways must be a prime candidate. Over several years the DfT has increasingly seemed incapable of falling over a wheelbarrow of common sense by failing to recognise it was there.
If Downing Street wants to see at least some of the ‘inherited-by-borrowedvote’ constituencies that now make up the Government’s majority experience a real difference in daily life, then how better to make it happen than by tangible improvements to train services, and not instead of but including HS2.
Live messaging
The LNER customer experience demonstrates that many of the problems with today’s railway are not about public or private ownership. Previously, Virgin Trains East Coast, and with many of the same management team, the directly operated LNER faces its share of problems affecting customer service. However, LNER’s David Horne, Warwick Dent and
Kate McFerran exude trust, which is the critical element underpinning leadership, and with the right focus can ensure customer experience to be altogether much more positive and better.
The social media (SM) team at LNER do a truly fantastic job. Twitter is one of the most popular SM channels for passenger information, and LNER are excellent in using it as an effective communication channel. They have managed to combine live messaging with a depth and detail customers appreciate. An example is the much-deserved praise for the sensitive way LNER handled disruption to its ECML services caused by a fatality that took place on December 20, 2019.
The LNER team reach the customer service threshold through knowing, understanding and
caring for their customers. I realise there will be some people who read this that may have a story about LNER or VTEC contradicting this view, but I’ve seen a scale of consistency, with the focus and engagement of LNER’s passengers not replicated by many other TOC’s. Even
Emma Duncan in The Times recently devoted her column to the way in which a member of LNER staff looked after a customer and went the extra mile. Other similar examples have emerged, too.
The column in The Times, entitled ‘Blunders into Triumphs’, set out a passenger experience from failure to success, crucially building credibility not just for LNER but, and here’s the point, ‘the railway’.
Consistency builds credibility, and the more credibility a company builds the more it shows it knows its customers, understands what’s important to them and that it cares. Across too much of our rail network at the moment, passengers are at the end of their tether with how much they are increasingly being expected to stump up in train fares for unreliable services, with some operators that are ineffective or indifferent when it comes to passenger communication. The level of inconsistency is far too high, and in some places and for some customers it’s starting to undermine rail travel as a first choice.
That’s why I recommend anyone in a leadership role at a TOC and even the wider rail sector take note of Kate McFerran’s ‘putthe-customer-first’ comment above. Customer experience has nothing to do with private/public ownership, but everything to do with trust, safety, quality, a willingness to please, service, cost, efficiency, management and above all leadership.
It’s no surprise VTEC also recognised the