Northern Rail win "Internal Communications Award"

[northwichcat]

http://www.rail.co/2011/06/27/northern-rail-wins-gold-communications-award/

They just need to work on external communications now!

 

[4SRKT]

My last negative experience of Northern Rail concerned a fatality at Rochdale which some staff at Manchester Victoria knew about and others didn't. Total chaos reigning and most staff as helpless as the passengers. Even one of those who did know recommended I got a train as far as Rochdale (was travelling to Bradford) and see what I could do from there, rather than go to Piccadilly and get TPE to Leeds.

The only thing that giving a communication award to a company like Northern serves to do is undermine confidence in communication awards. It's the awards equivalent of making Tony Blair a Middle East peace envoy.

 

[hairyhandedfool]

http://www.rail.co/2011/06/27/northern-rail-wins-gold-communications-award/

They just need to work on external communications now!

If Northern won the internal communications award, I shudder to think what the competition is like

 

[Boppawombat]

TO be fair though, they are trying. I can't begrudge them that. This is a vast improvement on what has gone before only - say - a mere 18 months ago.

I also help out as a volunteer for Northern Rail (specifically the Hope Valley and High Peak Transport Partnership) whereby we try and promote weekend train travel by throwing in special events like folk music trains and special walking trails through the Pennines between Manchester and Sheffield and beyond. These have been going on regularly for the last 15 years or so and are very well-established now, attracting as it does a healthy clientele of regulars who attend each month as well as lots of newcomers who are there through word of mouth from their friends.

With the exception of just one isolated unhappy incident regarding internal communications, I'd like to believe that there has been a big improvement overall.....



--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

My last negative experience of Northern Rail concerned a fatality at Rochdale which some staff at Manchester Victoria knew about and others didn't. Total chaos reigning and most staff as helpless as the passengers. Even one of those who did know recommended I got a train as far as Rochdale (was travelling to Bradford) and see what I could do from there, rather than go to Piccadilly and get TPE to Leeds.

The only thing that giving a communication award to a company like Northern serves to do is undermine confidence in communication awards. It's the awards equivalent of making Tony Blair a Middle East peace envoy.

Actually, Merseyrail should be the outright winners though. They are GENUINELY top of the pile when it comes to consistency of communication. I should know, I've had enough meetings with their managers over the years and this shows how approachable they are, as there isn't anything like the "them and us" gulf that exists between the management of this TOC and the travelling, fare-paying public that they are supposed to serve... They're commendable because they TAKE THEIR CAUSE AND MISSION OUT TO THE PUBLIC instead of hiding behind endless faceless bureaucracy and the like....

Which is something you cannot say about many other TOCs.

 

[First class]

--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

Actually, Merseyrail should be the outright winners though. They are GENUINELY top of the pile when it comes to consistency of communication. I should know, I've had enough meetings with their managers over the years and this shows how approachable they are, as there isn't anything like the "them and us" gulf that exists between the management of this TOC and the travelling, fare-paying public that they are supposed to serve... They're commendable because they TAKE THEIR CAUSE AND MISSION OUT TO THE PUBLIC instead of hiding behind endless faceless bureaucracy and the like....

Which is something you cannot say about many other TOCs.

Really? It would be useful if the Merseyrail staff felt the same way...
Merseyrail has one of the worst levels of communications with staff, never mind customers.

For starters, Liverpool Central CIS Departure boards list platforms, but no directions to platforms exist, and the platform numbers are difficult to find.

The CIS boards on the platforms at the busiest Merseyrail stations don't show calling points or booked time. Just destination, expected number of minutes, number of carriages.

The announcements from the Control Centre are poorly worded and often impossible to interpret or hear. Cause for delays are often very vague, sometime contradictory with no reason always given.

Staff on the ticket barriers have no additional information except for what is being announced, which is the same information as the public have, which as per above, is often vague.

No Arrivals information available to barrier staff/customers (other than public paper timetable), and because the Control only announce delays on DEPARTING services, staff can't tell you why your friend hasn't arrived yet, or where that train actually is...

Serious disruption is managed by stopping trains from entering into the tunnels so they can turn back, causing the busiest part of the network to become isolated and overcrowded. Staff then have no information to tell these stranded, angry passengers because nothing "extra" has been given to them by the Control, which makes people think the staff are lazy/lying etc.

That's what happens when you only have 1 or 2 people on shift to make announcements across 65 stations at once and those 2 people also have to monitor A LOT of CCTV, answer the help points, answer traincrew queries, update CIS and deal with disabled assistance out of office hours!!!

Merseyrail best at communication???! Merseyrail do their own thing their own way, and remain doing it that way until someone (important) tells them to stop. Anyone remember their own "on board" fares sold by guards that were about 100% more than buying at the station, were not in any fares manual, without ATOC knowledge and had to be Single fares only with no discounts, even child ones! Fourtunately they were removed when the Penalty Fare area was extended.

 

[Boppawombat]

Really? It would be useful if the Merseyrail staff felt the same way...
Merseyrail has one of the worst levels of communications with staff, never mind customers.

For starters, Liverpool Central CIS Departure boards list platforms, but no directions to platforms exist, and the platform numbers are difficult to find.

The CIS boards on the platforms at the busiest Merseyrail stations don't show calling points or booked time. Just destination, expected number of minutes, number of carriages.

The announcements from the Control Centre are poorly worded and often impossible to interpret or hear. Cause for delays are often very vague, sometime contradictory with no reason always given.

Staff on the ticket barriers have no additional information except for what is being announced, which is the same information as the public have, which as per above, is often vague.

No Arrivals information available to barrier staff/customers (other than public paper timetable), and because the Control only announce delays on DEPARTING services, staff can't tell you why your friend hasn't arrived yet, or where that train actually is...

Serious disruption is managed by stopping trains from entering into the tunnels so they can turn back, causing the busiest part of the network to become isolated and overcrowded. Staff then have no information to tell these stranded, angry passengers because nothing "extra" has been given to them by the Control, which makes people think the staff are lazy/lying etc.

That's what happens when you only have 1 or 2 people on shift to make announcements across 65 stations at once and those 2 people also have to monitor A LOT of CCTV, answer the help points, answer traincrew queries, update CIS and deal with disabled assistance out of office hours!!!

Merseyrail best at communication???! Merseyrail do their own thing their own way, and remain doing it that way until someone (important) tells them to stop. Anyone remember their own "on board" fares sold by guards that were about 100% more than buying at the station, were not in any fares manual, without ATOC knowledge and had to be Single fares only with no discounts, even child ones! Fourtunately they were removed when the Penalty Fare area was extended.

Everybody has their own particular opinions based on their experiences I suppose. It depends which part or level of the management / company you deal with though.

I have always - in general - found many of the staff approachable. I have given customer relations so much criticism over the past few years for all manner of issues it would break anybody's back....but it would appear that they have started to buck their ideas up at long last. The old nickname "Miseryrail" - although still bandied about by some, is starting to apply less to them now....

I can speak to various members of the control staff, the station staff, the divisional managerial staff - either via email or via phone - and the impression I get is that they DO listen and ARE communicative. With just one or two exceptions (there are two specific members of male staff who man the ticket office at Birkenhead North who are such complete and utter neanderthals they really should be kicked out), I have found most staff I talk to - in whatever capacity - at Merseyrail approachable and co-operative.

That's not to say that I find everything about Merseyrail hunky dory.....I have had as many negative experiences with them as positive ones over time ...so the ratio has been roughly equal. For example, I am particularly ****ed off about the INCONSISTENCY that still exists when it comes to enforcing the railway bye-laws on board the trains and at stations (whereby some jobsworths will nab you for putting your feet on seats whilst others would simply turn a blind eye to it, and in some cases their so-called "response unit officers" don't even bother to approach people seen openly flouting no-smoking regulations at underground stations, preferring to remain on the train with the guard.)

And another criticism I wish I could level at them face to face is their habit of recruiting too many boneheaded "scally" types to man the barriers and staff the stations - there are indeed a certain small minority of staff who possess such an attitude problem (and we see it with some female staff as well, so its not just an exclusively male thing), which is off-putting as I have observed the way they deal with passengers (myself being at the receiving end of a similar 'indifferent' attitude on the odd occasion). Obviously I have raised this in my regular feedback with management, citing specific members of staff and to suggest they go on an awareness training course and learn about behaving in a professional manner. Cockiness only gets you so far before the proverbial hits the fan, in my book. But then this happens everywhere, not just on Merseyrail. I think what is positive is that they are starting to recognise this as a problem and are actively working on eradicating this at all levels.


As for your point about the announcements: I get the feeling that there's already enough of them on other networks without Merseyrail having to jump on the bandwagon. Surely there comes a point where you have to say "enough pointless announcements are enough" and in actual fact on Merseyrail the ones broadcast over the stations have actually been reduced in number and most of them made more specific after a campaign that I myself instigated some time ago with a lot of passengers' help urging Merseyrail to "cut the crap". It appears they have listened and now rely less on cliched wording (such as "we would like to apologise for any inconvenience" and the word "sorry" actually being used because people respond better to it - really!!!) and keeping the announcements short and to the point.

They still have the same number of pre-recorded health and safety "nannying" messages being relayed across the PA and the automated ones inside the trains. The problem here though is half and half - the ones announced over the station tannoys are clear and audible whilst the ones on board the trains themselves are a complete waste of time because they ARE unintelligible due to the noise of the tunnel sections (so why have them at all when a human voice can do the job better?).

I don't know how often you actually USE Merseyrail because I have seldom had any experience with late running trains - and I travel on them five days a week. The problem that you mention of bad communication when it comes to disruption on services is pretty rare because the trains always run on time whenever I use them - except of course when the odd signalling problem (usually Network Rail's doing again) arises, causing the system to start going haywire, in which case we're in the same sort of territory as pretty much everywhere else.

Merseyrail are by no means faultless, but performance and punctuality wise they are second to none and have always had the highest percentage of reliable trains running. It's when things go wrong that we then notice the cracks showing, because to be fair, we're pretty used to having our train services always run on time - which is something you cannot say about the way the trains run in Greater Manchester (I also have a place in Stockport so know full well what it's like to use the services in that part of the north west as well).

Oh - and before I forget - there IS one other thing that I have found very irksome - the way many of the trains tend to be overheated with the heating left on full blast even during warmer/milder weather. This has been raised with the depot staff and they admit it is a problem they are still trying to address. They obviously forget that by leaving the heating on inside the carriages so high when the weather isn't even cold they are contradicting their own "environmentally aware" credentials - I've pointed out to them that the carbon footprint of each overheated Merseyrail train must be immense. They have no answer to that, obviously.....

 

[Lampshade]

The CIS boards on the platforms at the busiest Merseyrail stations don't show calling points or booked time. Just destination, expected number of minutes, number of carriages.

Why do they need to on an all-stops service with a 15 minute frequency?

 

[emoaconr]

Why do they need to on an all-stops service with a 15 minute frequency?

Alternate trains to Chester now miss out a few stops

 

[Boppawombat]

Alternate trains to Chester now miss out a few stops

Isn't it now a four trains an hour frequency to Chester? Coupled with two per hour to Ellesmere Port, meaning the common stretch between Green Lane and Hooton sees SIX trains an hour.

I didn't know they missed out a few stops..... does this mean Capenhurst is one of the ones the two extra trains don't stop at now?

It's become a very intensive service this one now...and it's telling that due to the short headways - and the fact that the Merseyrail Electrics share Chester station with a lot of main line trains - it's the least consistently punctual of the four main Wirral Line Branches.

 

[TUC]

I still remember an incident at Darlington when a large crowd were waiting for the 0630 Darlington to London service and a Northern Rail Pacer arrived on the platform around 0625 The crew got off and left it there, blocking the east coast service from being able to enter the station. It got to 0642 before the crew slowly ambled out of the staff room and moved it. Goodness know what had happened to internal communications-or common sense- on that day!

 

[hairyhandedfool]

TO be fair though, they are trying. I can't begrudge them that. This is a vast improvement on what has gone before only - say - a mere 18 months ago....

Overall, yes it has improved, but it's like saying I have improved my tennis skills, I can't see me beating Rafael Nadal though.

Northern have their priorities, I'm sure the Partnerships, Stakeholders and Station Adopters are high on the list, but other areas are, well, "lacking" might be an optomistic term.

 

[emoaconr]

Isn't it now a four trains an hour frequency to Chester? Coupled with two per hour to Ellesmere Port, meaning the common stretch between Green Lane and Hooton sees SIX trains an hour.

I didn't know they missed out a few stops..... does this mean Capenhurst is one of the ones the two extra trains don't stop at now?

It's become a very intensive service this one now...and it's telling that due to the short headways - and the fact that the Merseyrail Electrics share Chester station with a lot of main line trains - it's the least consistently punctual of the four main Wirral Line Branches.

Yes Capenhurst was originally the only stop they missed out - I'm not sure whether there are more or not now. Even with 4 trains an hour, the service is still fairly busy!

As for Chester, the Merseyrail services are more or less segregated from the rest of the station. Only platform 7 has electrified 3rd rail running through it and the Wirral spur of the triangular junction to the West of the station is exclusively used by Merseyrail, so really there's little co-ordination required with the rest of the ATW station.

And as for punctuality, yes there are often delays on this line, but I'd still place my money on Merseyrail running on time over ATW who operates the Borderlands line, of which it is very normal to have delays of up to 20 minutes and cancellations north of Shotton.

But long and short, you really have to know what you're doing with Merseyrail. You can't rely on them to know more if anything goes wrong. I know both Merseyrail and Northern are operated by the same parent, but there are huge differences in policy between the two.