Car allowances for senior Scotrail staff

[68000]

Unless its changed recently, band 2 and above at NR get one too.

Correct

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Many thanks for all your comments. Without entering into any debate about appropriate levels of remuneration, impact of market forces, competitive pressures etc, I return to my core point about identifying a specific payment as a car allowance. It may well be that some of these roles can be performed more easily if a car is available. It may be quite appropriate to augment the package so that a car can be afforded. It may be appropriate to pay mileage allowances. Nonetheless, it does seem perverse to make a specific payment towards an alternative (and in certain circumstances a competitive) mode of transport. This hardly looks like an encouragement to senior executives to use (or indeed rely on) the products and services for which they are responsible. In other sectors of the economy, regulators and stakeholders are keen to see that senior staff have "skin in the game", so that they focus their attention on delivering the best outcomes for their customers. It would be reassuring to feel that senior railway staff were given similar encouragement. After all, the culture in any organisation is set by and flows down from the top.

It is a non-pensionable allowance that can be used for anything, they just call it a car allowance. It will be fully taxed and is very common payment across all industries the higher up the tree you go

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 2 Jul 2022 ==

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Reading the various job roles, it is hard to get my head around how ScotRail is sturctured. Hynes is a NR employee therefore who is top of the tree in ScotRail? Is is Maguire and what is the relationship to Gibbs? Is there an Org chart kicking about?

 

[edwin_m]

It is a non-pensionable allowance that can be used for anything, they just call it a car allowance. It will be fully taxed and is very common payment across all industries the higher up the tree you go

When I signed on to a contract including a car allowance, I was obliged to provide a car at no cost to the company if I had a need to use one, including hiring at my own cost if necessary. At the time a company car was offered as an alternative - this was later discontinued either due to green policies or because so few people took it up once the tax advantages were removed in the 1990s. In either case mileage was reimbursed only at the lower rate recognised by HMRC* as covering only the marginal cost of driving extra distance on a car already owned and paid for.

I felt no pressure to drive when reasonable public transport alternatives were available, and ended up doing virtually all my business travel by train, but I can imagine some employers would behave differently and expect people to maximise use of the car they had "paid for" and thus reduce the visible cost of journeys. Doing so does of course ignore the possibility of doing useful work on a train, when driving is almost always "dead time". So in my case the quote above was correct, but others may have a different experience depending on the demands of the specific job and the attitude of their managers.

Employees without a car allowance were reimbursed at a higher rate to cover ownership costs* if they chose to use their own vehicle, but unless it was a very short trip they were encouraged to book a hire car. In that case it the hire would be arranged and paid by the company and the employee would claim the fuel costs back via expenses. Anyone using their own vehicle had to present evidence of insurance covering use for work purposes.

*This is of course a nonsense, since there are so many fixed costs involved in owning a car and the costs of driving one also vary wildly.

 

[ninja-lewis]

It’s beneficial for organisations to pay extra money as an ‘allowance’ because more often than not they are not pensionable and also they don’t count towards a compounded percentage point salary increase.

Very much this. Calling it "Car allowance" saves having to come up with another name and anyone applying for a job like this knows the score.

 

[Ianigsy]

Definitely true - too many people in more senior roles who keep their operational hat on but forget they are now in more strategic positions and need to focus on that area, which then falls by the wayside a bit. I get that many "miss" that sort of environment, but the junior and middle-ranking operational roles need to be trusted to get on with.

This may also be why senior leaders are sometiems brought in with limited or no industry experience.

You need both, I think - one of the issues in the organisation where I currently work is that we have a very forward-thinking leadership team trying to push the vision for the next ten years to a workforce which is mostly in the 50-65 age bracket, hanging on for redundancy or retirement and not remotely interested in where the organisation’s going to be in 2030 as long as it’s paying their pension.

 

[Ex-controller]

I suspect the jobs will only be available to drivers. It's very often a requirement for jobs if they might need to get somewhere at times when public transport is not workable, which is fairly likely of a public transport manager except where there are 24 hour operations.

It could be seen as discrimination against those who cannot drive for medical reasons, but you only have to make reasonable adjustments, not any adjustment even vaguely possible.

A reasonable adjustment in this case would probably be to provide a taxi anyway.

 

[AngusH]

Staff at such a senior level would very rarely be called out to attend an incident; Only the most serious, eg Carmont, and even then they do not have to be there immediately.

That doesn't seem to disagree with the idea that they might be called out to odd locations though at some time though,
thus requiring access to a car for essential business?

They couldn't have taken the train to Carmont (service stopped due to the accident)
and I can't see there is an obvious bus.

Possibly you could have pool cars at major stations and depots and go from there?
Or rely on network rail maintenance staff to shuttle them to the sites?
(Both seem rather old-fashioned as ideas go these days)

I'm not sure you could rely on either hire cars or taxis given that both would be heavily used in times of disrupton?

Edit: my point here is that if something may ever be required for a job, the company should provide it or pay the full (not marginal) costs of the tool.
You can probably buy a workable car for the figure supplied.

This should really apply to all workers btw not just directors.

 

[deltic]

Quite a few organisations have brought out company cars and car allowances as they send out the wrong corporate message on sustainability. On the other hand you can still get cars via salary sacrifice and tax discounts if they are EVs with some companies.

 

[matt_world2004]

Didn't Peter Hendy have a huge car/taxi allowance when he was at tfl. Even when travelling between head office buildings that were in zone 1. And easily reachable on tfl services (Eg 55 Broadway to Palestra)

 

[380101]

Reading the various job roles, it is hard to get my head around how ScotRail is sturctured. Hynes is a NR employee therefore who is top of the tree in ScotRail? Is is Maguire and what is the relationship to Gibbs? Is there an Org chart kicking about?

Chris Gibb is the CEO of Scottish Rail Holdings Ltd - the owning company of ScotRail Trains Ltd. Scottish Rail Holdings Ltd are a wholly owned company of the Scottish Government. So essentially, Scottish Rail Holdings ltd is the "parent company" similar to First Group, Arriva, Abellio etc and ScotRail Trains Ltd is the operating company of the ScotRail franchise under the operator of last resort and still adhering to the franchise rules.

Alex Hynes is the Managing Director of ScotRail Trains Ltd and Scotland's Railways - formerly known as the ScotRail Alliance. Since 2015 when the Alliance began the MD had always been a Network Rail employee for some reason.

Joanne Maguire is the Chief Operating Officer of ScotRail Trains Ltd and is Alex Hynes' deputy. In reality she is the person running the show in ScotRail Trains Ltd on a day to day basis. Alex Hynes is very rarely seen by any of us at ScotRail.

 

[Broucek]

Car allowances allow competitive senior pay without bumping up pension costs further

 

[Trainbike46]

Car allowances allow competitive senior pay without bumping up pension costs further

Though that purpose could be achieved with calling it any type of allowance, without giving the impression that scotrail supports car usage. For example, you could call it a travel allowance, WFH allowance, or even just non-pensionable pay. Or if you wanted to, you could package it into a performance bonus of some type. There is no need to call it a car allowance for that purpose.

I agree it is a point of limited relevance, but I do think it is important for the optics to not appear to support car usage

 

[Jimini]

Car allowances allow competitive senior pay without bumping up pension costs further

Somewhat surprisingly, my place recently folded the car allowance in to our salaries if you didn't have a company car (I don't currently). Wasn't expecting that -- car allowance is £6,688 per annum. But you're absolutely right -- it's an easy way to add on to a basic package without all the associated risk (pensions, potential redundancy payouts etc.).

 

[DarloRich]

I think this topic might be being "over thinked"

A car allowance was a natty little ruse developed when it became not advantageous taxation wise to offer a company car to senior officers. It is also a useful way to boost remuneration without increasing the pension/redundancy etc burden on the company. It is fairly standard and not worth getting any knickers in a twist over.

You can probably buy a workable car for the figure supplied.

It is not offered ONLY to fund a car.

 

[185]

Utterly disgraceful salaries.

But that said, they still look 30-60% lower than most other TOC bosses pay

 

[Horizon22]

Utterly disgraceful salaries.

But that said, they still look 30-60% lower than most other TOC bosses pay

How is it “disgraceful” or tongue in cheek? Considering how many levels there are between say a driver (already probably reaching £50K+) and the director of operations or the most junior station grade, it’s only natural for a large organisation to have people on 6 figure salaries. Would you want a promotion and no increase in wage?

Private companies can be far worse in this regard with people on £500K+ and much wider disparities between the highest and lowest paid.

 

[Broucek]

How is it “disgraceful” or tongue in cheek? Considering how many levels there are between say a driver (already probably reaching £50K+) and the director of operations or the most junior station grade, it’s only natural for a large organisation to have people on 6 figure salaries. Would you want a promotion and no increase in wage?

I do pay for a living and this point is often ignored. If your most junior level job is on £25k and there are 20 levels above then a 15% differential by level gets you to £400k....

 

[mpthomson]

Remove the somewhat nonsensical car allowance (that you can opt to take as cash instead), and just add it on to the salary.

The reason it's given in that form is that it's not pensionable. Bonuses are used in the civil service for the same reason. It tops up salary without adding to the pension burden for the organisation.

 

[185]

How is it “disgraceful” or tongue in cheek? Considering how many levels there are between say a driver (already probably reaching £50K+) and the director of operations or the most junior station grade, it’s only natural for a large organisation to have people on 6 figure salaries. Would you want a promotion and no increase in wage?

Private companies can be far worse in this regard with people on £500K+ and much wider disparities between the highest and lowest paid.

The current cost, expenditure and state of the railway does not warrant any of the current people running it being paid over £80000 of taxpayers money. 'Rewarding failure' is seemingly the new transforming travel. Usual people defending that failure every time... just like those backing Boris tonight.

 

[AlterEgo]

The current cost, expenditure and state of the railway does not warrant any of the current people running it being paid over £80000 of taxpayers money. 'Rewarding failure' is seemingly the new transforming travel. Usual people defending that failure every time... just like those backing Boris tonight.

Alright, get a CEO for £80K and see how things go.

 

[Llanigraham]

The current cost, expenditure and state of the railway does not warrant any of the current people running it being paid over £80000 of taxpayers money. 'Rewarding failure' is seemingly the new transforming travel. Usual people defending that failure every time... just like those backing Boris tonight.

Well if you want to pay senior staff peanuts then expect to see monkeys in control.

 

[43066]

The current cost, expenditure and state of the railway does not warrant any of the current people running it being paid over £80000 of taxpayers money. 'Rewarding failure' is seemingly the new transforming travel. Usual people defending that failure every time... just like those backing Boris tonight.

I’m not sure this really stands up to scrutiny given the size of the organisations involved and the fact that the reasons for “failure” (as you put it) are often not down to individual TOCs, but the structure of the whole industry?

Railway staff get fed up enough with people who don’t understand their jobs moaning that they’re overpaid, so best not to start doing the same to others!

 

[Taunton]

Whatever or not the arguments may be about the levels of remuneration, isn't it strange that the package for those responsible for running the railway includes a specific allowance for the cost of a car? Hardly an encouragement towards ensuring the trains actually run on time.

It's got nothing to do with running the trains on time.

At a senior level you expect this sort of thing as part of your package. If not provided, because of some attribute of the employer, you notably restrict the people who will go for the post. You get this sort of thing elsewhere - it is also standard for higher executives to receive BUPA private medical cover, which the NHS inevitably does not offer, and is seen as a significant problem to them recruiting/retaining senior staff compared to other competing positions.

Going with the job is that, if you get the call at home at 2 am that there has been some serious incident, off you go. Now that, for senior management, is fully expected that it (very occasionally and hopefully never) goes with the job and the territory. How else are they going to get there?

 

[Horizon22]

The current cost, expenditure and state of the railway does not warrant any of the current people running it being paid over £80000 of taxpayers money. 'Rewarding failure' is seemingly the new transforming travel. Usual people defending that failure every time... just like those backing Boris tonight.

That is essentially completely economically illiterate - please go and find me any company with more than 5,000 people paying less than £80K for the top job? I imagine charities will still have people paying more. It’s a completely uncompetitive wage or do you just want every single member of staff to be an enthusiast who doesn’t care about salary? This is an idea just not rooted in reality.

Are you supportive of Scotrail front line staff getting a salary rise? If so, naturally over time their manager is on more and then their manager and so on. Otherwise why would anyone be in a senior role? These roles have to exist for basic organisation reasons. Drivers can get paid upwards of £50K and even platform staff can reach £25-30K (with allowances). Nobody would ever want to manage under your system. And you’ll get more “failure” as you put in by nothing having suitably qualified people in senior roles. Pay isn’t everything, but it’s a big, if not the major factor in why people work.

 

[185]

If so, naturally over time their manager is on more and then their manager and so on.

The problem is not those essential management jobs. It's the 1000s of people in offices who effectively do nothing who need to go, especially as technology replaces many functions of management such as planning and finance.

Northern:

Director of Rolling Stock Programmes​	Various	22/07/2022​	​	​	​	​
Location Various Director of Rolling Stock Programmes Leeds, Manchester, Newcastle or York​

Is this for their new sitcom, Pacers?

There's about 50-100 of these jobs appearing every year on Northern's jobs page alone.

Also each TOC's £70M to £200M of public cash straight into the pockets of shareholders every year. These handouts must stop, then, the 7% pay rise can be paid.

 

[Horizon22]

The problem is not those essential management jobs. It's the 1000s of people in offices who effectively do nothing who need to go, especially as technology replaces many functions of management such as planning and finance.

Northern:

Director of Rolling Stock Programmes​	Various	22/07/2022​	​	​	​	​
Location Various Director of Rolling Stock Programmes Leeds, Manchester, Newcastle or York​

Is this for their new sitcom, Pacers?

There's about 50-100 of these jobs appearing every year on Northern's jobs page alone.

Also each TOC's £70M to £200M of public cash straight into the pockets of shareholders every year. These handouts must stop, then, the 7% pay rise can be paid.

I think I'm going to stop replying because you see incapable of understanding how businesses and operations work and your pithy remarks are so misinformed its ridiculous, but what experience do you have to suggest that these people "do nothing" (and you feel so strongly you've underlined it!). This sounds like a pretty important job to me. Note they need to be a chartered engineer with a wide range of railway experience and they're literally the lead for all of Northern's stock.

As a Chartered Engineer you will lead and shape the specifications of new vehicles. Our new fleet designs will need to fully incorporate a range of requirements including operational performance, digitally enabled, maintainability, reliability, engineering cost optimisation, internal ambience, customer and stakeholder expectations. New rolling stock will also involve changes to depot and stabling facilities to ensure that our new fleet achieves the government decarbonisation goals.

The Rolling Stock Strategy will integrate with a wider Engineering Transformation programme, so you will work collaboratively with the wider business to achieve the programme’s objective. As a member of our executive leadership team, you will also be an enabler of wider business transformation and you will role model our values that will bring about change.

You will

• Demonstrate experience of UK DMU/EMU/DEMU/BEMU rolling stock capabilities.
• Have a good appreciation of railway operations, safety standards and train service planning.
• Have experience of delivering major project within the rail industry, including the delivery of new trains.
• Demonstrate strong leadership and people skills combined with commercial awareness and the ability to play a part in a growing and dynamic high-performance team.
• Be able to demonstrate, promote and embed safe working behaviours within the team and external supply chain.
• Have a solid knowledge of managing multisite operations, production, and delivery of comprehensive and compliant programmes.
  

Also I'd like to see "technology" replacing all of management!

Presumably they are because Northern need these people - given how much scrutiny the railway is under financially, its not even that easy to recruit. The vast majority of the jobs on the Northern page are front-line roles. You might have concerns about shareholders and fair enough, but that's not going to stop people being hired into such roles under a nationalised system or if the "handouts" stop.

 

[43066]

The problem is not those essential management jobs. It's the 1000s of people in offices who effectively do nothing who need to go, especially as technology replaces many functions of management such as planning and finance.

When front line operational roles are chronically under resourced to save money, why do you imagine TOCs employ any more office staff than they need to, let alone employing people who “effectively do nothing”?

The impression I get is that the back office functions are just as thinly stretched as the front line. It certainly shows when dealing with (for example) TOC IT departments who are universally woeful in my experience.

 

[Dave W]

The problem is not those essential management jobs. It's the 1000s of people in offices who effectively do nothing who need to go, especially as technology replaces many functions of management such as planning and finance.

If you think that planning and shared service roles can be automated any quicker than front line operational roles, then I'm afraid you're going to have to think again.

Once again, you appear to be completely misunderstanding the functions of a large organisation employing thousands of people. The several dozen thousand of front line staff across the UK railway industry can't get on with their jobs without the back office functions, whether you like it or not.

As for shareholders, this is a crippling problem in the public sector as well. Probably more so.

 

[Deltic1961]

Leadership comes from the top. When we see a Scottish Government who have instigated a "climate emergency" getting chauffeured around in a fleet of limos it tells you all you need to know.

Patrick Harvie does plenty of photoshoots handing out millions to Green projects but I bet he doesn't walk, wheel or cycle there.

Despite searching the Web nobody can actually say how Greta got to Glastonbury. Funny that.

 

[DarloRich]

The problem is not those essential management jobs. It's the 1000s of people in offices who effectively do nothing who need to go, especially as technology replaces many functions of management such as planning and finance.

is that right? you are clearly a man who knows his stuff. Have you thought of setting yourself up as an efficiency consultant? You would clean up.

 

[ExRes]

The problem is not those essential management jobs. It's the 1000s of people in offices who effectively do nothing who need to go, especially as technology replaces many functions of management such as planning

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Presumably you have a job, are you volunteering to pay a nice fat tax an NI increase to fund unemployment benefits for all these 1000s of people who 'need to go'?