If these people are as incapable of driving trains as you suggest then clearly it's in the best interest of the business to let them go, without the requirement to pay back any training costs incurred. And no doubt give them a glowing reference too!
It’s not me suggesting it, it was the people who were training, assessing and managing them. Not sure why you seem to have an issue with that? These are just the people I have known personally, there will be many more across the industry.
Clearly it’s going to be highly problematic getting people who are unsuitable to pay anything back. So it’s not such a stretch to imagine that, if people who want to leave the grade are threatened with tens of thousands of pounds worth of repayments, they might just be tempted to start deliberately having incidents…
I’d question how useful that experience really is because, like most other aspects of the railway, it’s generally stuck in the dark ages (hence clauses like we are discussing). Some of us have experience from outside the industry, so have something to compare it with.
And that's exactly my point regarding London. If you live say 20 miles your home depot, it makes little difference if you work at your Depot A, or Depot B one mile down the road. If you live 1 mile from Depot A but they're not recruiting, and Depot B is 20 miles away but taking on trainee drivers, it make sense to go for the job at Depot B, get your key and then apply to Depot A that you live a mile away from as a qualified driver when they take on drivers. Is that simple enough to understand? Whichever TOC you work for, I would suggest they pay more than drivers get at mine.
Is that simple enough to understand? Unbelievably patronising
.
What
you clearly don’t understand is that the way these terms are currently drafted means they’re of highly questionable enforceability, hence many people leave without paying anything during their PQA period (myself included). Whether you agree with that or not is largely irrelevant.
You do realise not everyone in this industry draws a circle around where they currently live on a map, and refuses to work anywhere outside it? You’re
still missing the point that all depots aren’t equal; I recently moved closer to my old depot than where I lived when I worked there, but I wouldn’t go back there even if it was on my doorstep.
If your TOC pays that badly, perhaps that’s something they should look to address in time, to reduce turnover of drivers, rather than threatening new joiners.
