Virgin Trains East Coast franchise to end 24 June 2018 and is temporarily re-nationalised

[jyte]

Okay: I'm about to book a train ticket on VTEC for the weekend of the 18th....

This is gonna sound dumb, but there's gonna be a train there right?

 

[yorkie]

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-42945709

Transport Secretary Chris Grayling said Stagecoach would continue running the London to Edinburgh line only for "a small number of months".

The contract, originally due to end in 2023, has already been cut short once.

Mr Grayling said day-to-day operation of the line would be unaffected.

Mr Grayling said he was urgently seeking a successor arrangement, but had not yet decided which company would be awarded the franchise.

He said Stagecoach would be allowed to continue operating the franchise on a short-term and not-for-profit basis....

I am not surprised; the way they are treating both customers and staff alike is atrocious. The management of the company is abysmal at times.

I know several people who are fed up of working for them, and say the culture is all wrong from the very top. I feel for them.

As a customer, I've also been mistreated and lied to repeatedly by the company, and I know of several others who have. Their customer service is abysmal.

You can't run a successful company by increasing prices, reducing quality and treating staff and passengers like crap. It just does not work. Good riddance to the rotten management.

It was also entirely foreseeable that this would happen as the premium payments were never going to be sustainable. The only surprise is that it's happened sooner than expected.

 

[DarloRich]

thanks for sharing this new information - I need to digest it and have a think.

 

[ainsworth74]

This is gonna sound dumb, but there's gonna be a train there right?

Yes there will be no interruption of service unless something utterly catastrophic happens. Worst case scenario the franchise falls over and the DfT bring it back in house. Now I cannot guarantee that there won't be disruption on the ECML meaning the train is cancelled anyway but it won't be due to the current fiasco at least

 

[Mugby]

It's a shame Martin Griffiths started that 'truth' video with claims of improvement such as a 'better on board journeys with first class catering' and 'new website and smartphone app'.

I'm sure many here would agree that none of those have been particularly successful.

He also said "We've delivered a completely refurbished train fleet" To what extent is this true?

 

[GaryMcEwan]

Can they just hold off until the end of the month please before going under, I'm going to London at the end of the month. That said though, I've never experienced any problems when I've travelled with VTEC on their early morning GLC - KGX service. In fact, I'd rather travel VTEC then VTWC.

 

[ainsworth74]

He also said "We've delivered a completely refurbished train fleet" To what extent is this true?

That is true to be fair. They've refurbished the whole VTEC fleet to some extent.

 

[matt_world2004]

Grayling needs to go this mess happened on his watch.

 

[3141]

Grayling....has said "Virgin got their sums wrong" and that steps have been taken to avoid overbidding on future franchises.

Grayling is completely wedded to the privatised railway concept and kept going on about how Stagecoach's errors have cost it £200m and also that the franchise remains profitable.

Of course bidders bid as high as they think they can, because they want to win. They won't always get it right because no-one can forecast exactly what is going to happen over the next seven years or more. The DfT's examination of the bid should identify any unrealistic elements, but they've got it wrong three times on ICEC. Just like the bidders really wanting to win, DfT really wants to get high bids, because they want to show the Treasury that all that money that goes into the rail system can produce a good return. I do not believe that the DfT can "take effective steps" to prevent overbidding. They have expectations about what level of bids a franchise should attract and they'll be pleased if someone bids more and it all appears sound. I'll be very surprised if we hear that in one of the upcoming franchise bids the highest bid has been rejected because the DfT thinks it's too high.

It's stretching things to say that the East Coast franchise remains profitable. It is possible to make a surplus from running it, but it isn't profitable if the operator has undertaken to pay premiums at the level offered by VTEC, NatEx and GNER.

 

[3141]

Grayling needs to go this mess happened on his watch.

It was his Patrick McLoughlin who awarded the East Coast franchise to VTEC. Also Northern to Arriva and TPE to First, if I remember correctly. They may be the next ones to have problems as a result of electrification schemes running late.

 

[westv]

I assume the Azumas will still be zooming in 2019

 

[Chrism20]

Can they just hold off until the end of the month please before going under, I'm going to London at the end of the month. That said though, I've never experienced any problems when I've travelled with VTEC on their early morning GLC - KGX service. In fact, I'd rather travel VTEC then VTWC.

You’ll be glad you weren’t on it this morning, it was 146L into the cross due to the issues with the signalling.

 

[Hadders]

Can they just hold off until the end of the month please before going under, I'm going to London at the end of the month. That said though, I've never experienced any problems when I've travelled with VTEC on their early morning GLC - KGX service. In fact, I'd rather travel VTEC then VTWC.

No need to worry. There will be continuity of service, whether run by the DfT through a DOR style operation or by VTEC under a management contract.

 

[daikilo]

Of course bidders bid as high as they think they can, because they want to win. They won't always get it right because no-one can forecast exactly what is going to happen over the next seven years or more. The DfT's examination of the bid should identify any unrealistic elements, but they've got it wrong three times on ICEC. Just like the bidders really wanting to win, DfT really wants to get high bids, because they want to show the Treasury that all that money that goes into the rail system can produce a good return. I do not believe that the DfT can "take effective steps" to prevent overbidding. They have expectations about what level of bids a franchise should attract and they'll be pleased if someone bids more and it all appears sound. I'll be very surprised if we hear that in one of the upcoming franchise bids the highest bid has been rejected because the DfT thinks it's too high.

It's stretching things to say that the East Coast franchise remains profitable. It is possible to make a surplus from running it, but it isn't profitable if the operator has undertaken to pay premiums at the level offered by VTEC, NatEx and GNER.

I suspect that in addition to the fact that they have lost 200M after payments to government of 800M, thus are making an operating loss of at least 200M, they are also faced with upcoming competition from the Transpenine TOC and from Open Access First which they probably did not (correctly) account for in their bid.. I am not a supporter of VTEC but what is happening causes me to question the whole methodology by which Franchises are let.

 

[westv]

It all went wrong when they got rid of Rewards.

 

[WatcherZero]

Is it me but if the railways were not privatised would this £271m not have come into the countries coffers?
And are Stagecoach "too big to fail"? And if not let them go to the wall

They are risking their own capital rather than public funds, they also put in £925m of their own private investment last year, i.e to get that £270m back the government would have to be spending nearly a billion more of taxpayer money.

 

[Mugby]

This is an absolute gift for Jeremy Corbyn at PMQs on Wednesday. I hope he goes with this instead of the NHS for a change!

 

[Danfilm007]

No one comes out of this cleanly - Stagecoach/VT, in hindsight, have overbid (but who COULD predict circumstances like the last year?), but seeing as a lot of their bid needed investment and infrastructure that NR and the Government haven't delivered - I fear this is one mess no one can fix.

 

[GaryMcEwan]

You’ll be glad you weren’t on it this morning, it was 146L into the cross due to the issues with the signalling.

I was over an hour late back in April of last year when I travelled with them as well, got 2 1st Class carnets in return though to be used within a year. I could do an hour late, but 2 and a half hours though, I'd be pulling my hair out...

 

[plcd1]

Of course bidders bid as high as they think they can, because they want to win. They won't always get it right because no-one can forecast exactly what is going to happen over the next seven years or more. The DfT's examination of the bid should identify any unrealistic elements, but they've got it wrong three times on ICEC. Just like the bidders really wanting to win, DfT really wants to get high bids, because they want to show the Treasury that all that money that goes into the rail system can produce a good return. I do not believe that the DfT can "take effective steps" to prevent overbidding. They have expectations about what level of bids a franchise should attract and they'll be pleased if someone bids more and it all appears sound. I'll be very surprised if we hear that in one of the upcoming franchise bids the highest bid has been rejected because the DfT thinks it's too high.

It's stretching things to say that the East Coast franchise remains profitable. It is possible to make a surplus from running it, but it isn't profitable if the operator has undertaken to pay premiums at the level offered by VTEC, NatEx and GNER.

I was trying to represent Mr Grayling's words and typing as I actually listened to his statement and subsequent questions. It is not always possible to be painstakingly precise in such circumstances, especially when Mr G was hardly precise himself.

I am well aware of how these procurements work in terms of "economically advantageous bids" (i.e. the most dosh) being favoured. My *guess* is that Mr G was referring to the use of quality criteria as a way to "prevent" overbidding. He specifically said this was being used on the South Eastern bid with a different risk allocation between the parties. Sounds to me like more "ripping off" of how TfL run their concession contracts but then that's been my suspicion for a very long while. I appreciate that some franchises have been awarded on the basis of "quality" but still have heroic financial payments attached to them.

Again on the "profitable" point that was me representing what Mr G said to the House. I have not inspected VTEC's finances so have no way of knowing what is going on in any detail. I am aware of the broader issues affecting the francise. I'm not even sure I've travelled with VTEC since they took over but then my rail use is very low. I therefore can't really comment any further about the service Virgin offer even if the ECML is the route I am most familiar with in the UK (lots of use when it was good old BR Inter City East Coast and also GNER days).

 

[tbwbear]

I assume the Azumas will still be zooming in 2019

Azuma is a VTEC brand isn't it ?

So the new trains will be running (one would presume), but they will be called something else - won't they ?

 

[ainsworth74]

Azuma is a VTEC brand isn't it ?

So the new trains will be running (one would presume), but they will be called something else - won't they ?

In the same way that Voyager is a Virgin brand?

 

[Qwerty133]

I assume the Azumas will still be zooming in 2019

The electric ones almost certainly will as there is nowhere else for them to go but hopefully Mr Grayling will use the opportunity to use the Bi-Modes elsewhere where they would be more use in replacing HSTs rather than 91s+mk4s that are much easier to get through DDA legislation.

 

[Agent_Squash]

The electric ones almost certainly will as there is nowhere else for them to go but hopefully Mr Grayling will use the opportunity to use the Bi-Modes elsewhere where they would be more use in replacing HSTs rather than 91s+mk4s that are much easier to get through DDA legislation.

So use the electric 801s to replace the diesel HSTs? Just a tad confused...

 

[ainsworth74]

The electric ones almost certainly will as there is nowhere else for them to go but hopefully Mr Grayling will use the opportunity to use the Bi-Modes elsewhere where they would be more use in replacing HSTs rather than 91s+mk4s that are much easier to get through DDA legislation.

In which case how do you propose to continue to serve Harrogate, Sunderland, Hull, Lincoln, Aberdeen and Inverness along with possibly serving Middlesbrough and Huddersfield?

 

[tbwbear]

In the same way that Voyager is a Virgin brand?

Isn't Voyager the manufacturer's brand, in the same way as Pendolino?

I thought Azuma was a VTEC thing. They derived it from an old Japanese word for "east".

 

[ainsworth74]

Isn't Voyager the manufacturer's brand, in the same way as Pendolino?

I thought Azuma was a VTEC thing. They derived it from an old Japanese word for "east".

Azuma is definitely a Virgin thing. I must admit I was under the impression that Voyager was also a Virgin thing.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

The electric ones almost certainly will as there is nowhere else for them to go but hopefully Mr Grayling will use the opportunity to use the Bi-Modes elsewhere where they would be more use in replacing HSTs rather than 91s+mk4s that are much easier to get through DDA legislation.

They will be staying on the ECML.
Everything is geared to Doncaster/Craigentinny maintenance.
The bi-modes were specifically acquired to replace VTEC's HSTs.

 

[Tetchytyke]

they also put in £925m of their own private investment last year

No they didn't.

Isn't Voyager the manufacturer's brand, in the same way as Pendolino?

No, it's a Virgin trade name. So is Voyager, hence why XC don't refer to their 220/221 trains by that name. Pendolino is a manufacturer name though.

Azuma is a stupid name, so it won't be a disaster if it goes.

But don't worry, Grayling will make sure Griffiths gets his bailout.

 

[Tetchytyke]

a lot of their bid needed investment and infrastructure that NR and the Government haven't delivered

So Martin Griffiths keeps saying.

The National Audit Office think differently.