Late trains, cancelled services – and millions of pounds in fines
The reasons why the fine posted on Welsh train operator Keolis Amey has increased have been revealed. Last month it was announced that a £2.3m fine issued because of poor train performance had risen to more than £3m. The fine is issued by Transport for Wales to the company in charge of operating its trains – Keolis Amey – if it fails to hit performance targets. Political editor Ruth Mosalski reports
KEOLIS Amey was awarded the £5bn Wales and borders franchise in October 2018. Since April 1, 2019 there have been 10 periods which are assessed.
Performance in each of those fourweekly periods is checked and divided into Valley lines services and all other Welsh services run by Transport for Wales.
For the first three periods of the financial year, Valleys lines services met their targets, and bonus payments were issued. In the same period, a fine of almost £500,000 was issued for services elsewhere in Wales missing the target.
Since April 2019, a £355,025 fine was issued on four separate occasions for missed targets on non-Valleys line services.
While there are three ways that fines can be issued, the fines below were all issued because of performance time lost – the biggest incentive for operators to run services on time.
■ How each period compares...
APRIL 1-APRIL 27
The target for non-Valleys line services was to arrive within one minute and five seconds. The target was missed by 14 seconds, resulting in a fine of £133,719.60.
For Valleys lines services the target of arriving within 47 seconds of the scheduled time was met (with services arriving an average of 35 seconds late, per passenger) meaning a bonus of £18,013.29.
APRIL 29-MAY 25
The target for non-Valleys line services was to arrive within one minute and five seconds. The target was missed by five seconds, resulting in a fine of £138,266.07.
For Valleys lines services the target of arriving within 46 seconds of the scheduled time was met (with services arriving an average of 38 seconds late, per passenger) meaning a bonus of £13,834.57.
MAY 26-JUNE 22
The non-Valleys line service target was missed by 20 seconds, resulting in a fine of £221,439.66.
For Valleys lines services the target of arriving within 46 seconds of the scheduled time was met (with services arriving an average of 40 seconds late, per passenger) meaning a bonus of £10,306.57.
JUNE 23-JULY 20
Valleys lines services had a target of arriving no more than an average of 46 seconds late per passenger.
That was missed by 24 seconds, resulting in a fine of £31,542.68.
The target for other services was one minute and five seconds but was missed by an average per passenger of one minute six seconds, resulting in a £307,688.80 fine.
JULY 21-AUGUST 17
A fine of £331,357.17 was issued because the average delay per passenger on non-Valleys line trains was missed by a minute and 17 seconds.
On Valleys lines, a fine of £45,739.78 was issued because the target of 46 seconds was missed by a minute and 11 seconds.
AUGUST 18-SEP 14
The target of arriving no later than an average of a minute and nine seconds late, was missed by a minute and eight seconds, landing Keolis Amey a fine of £355,025.54 on nonValleys lines.
Valley lines services missed their target by 14 seconds, resulting in a £49,897.94.
SEP 15-OCTOBER 12
The target on Valleys lines services was missed by 48 seconds meaning a £54,056.10 fine. On non-Valleys lines services, it was missed by 51 seconds meaning a £355,025.54 fine.
OCTOBER 13-NOV 9
The target for non-Valleys lines services was missed by an average of one minute and 26 seconds resulting in a fine of £354,456.94. On Valleys lines services it was missed by 57 seconds, meaning a fine of £58,214.26.
NOV 10-DEC 7
The biggest fines were issued on both metrics this month with a £355,025.54 fine for non-Valley lines trains and £62,251.31 on Valleys services. The target was missed by 57 seconds on Valleys line services, and two minutes, 26 seconds on non-Valleys lines.
DEC 8-JANUARY 4
In this period, the target of nonValleys lines trains arriving no more than an average of a minute late per passenger was missed by two minutes and 35 seconds, meaning a fine of £355,025.54. There was also a fine of £52,320.17 for Valleys lines services, which missed target by an average of 16 seconds.
■ How are fines decided? There are three ways a train operator can be fined...
1. Passenger Time Lost (PTL): This is the biggest financial incentive for a train operator to deliver services on time – in short, it means if their services are late they are fined and get less money to run their services.
2. Short formations: This is to stop operators being able to run trains made up of less carriages than they promised. So, if a four-carriage train is promised, but it runs as a two carriage train, a fine will be issued. This is calculated annually. 3. Percentage of stops missed: To ensure operators don’t skip the same stops every time, and impact the same passengers day after day, the trains cancelled cannot be on the same line all the time.
■ Why does TFW say it is doing better than ATW when many trains are still late?
Transport for Wales says that when it set out the benchmarks that the new operator had to meet, it made the contract tougher so Arriva Trains Wales and Keolis Amey have different criteria to meet.
Transport for Wales say their terms for Keolis Amey are much tougher.
■ What happens to the fine?
If it’s decided that Keolis Amey should be fined, Transport for Wales will hold money back from the monthly sum it gives the operator to run the service – the so-called grant agreement. That means the operator has less money to meet the contract it signed up to.
It means that there is surplus money in the Transport for Wales pot.
As a not-for-profit company, it
doesn’t take that as profit and wants it spent on the railways.
Keolis Amey can pitch – via a formal business plan – to get extra money, but it has to be spent on improving railways in Wales. It’s not in Keolis Amey’s interest to have to run a service for less money, so should act as an incentive for it not to happen.
■ What does Keolis Amey say?
Speaking when the fine was first made public, Keolis Amey chief executive Kevin Thomas said: “I would like to apologise for the disruption caused to passengers over the past few months. We recognise that we have not been able to deliver the quality of service that we aim to and that our passengers across the network deserve.
“Working in partnership with Transport for Wales, we are undertaking a transformation of our railway that is going to take time. It is encouraging to report that we are starting to see some improvements, with a 24% reduction in network delay minutes following the introduction of our December timetable.
“We have welcomed the arrival of the Class 170s, the recruitment of over 200 additional train crew and the introduction of more than 186 new Sunday services. We have also reintroduced regular passenger services along the Halton Curve (between Wrexham/Chester and Liverpool) and seen the refurbishment of stations across the network, all at the same time as we’re investing £40m in our existing fleet.
“Amongst this progress, we know we must do better, and we look forward to meeting with the Economy Minister next month as we all look to build on these improvements.”