Passengers locked inside Hartlepool station

[MartinC]

When hiring a camping coach at Hinton Admiral in the 1960's we had the keys to the station as the camping coach did not have a loo

 

[saismee]

I've seen enough broken ticket machines, next train displays and various other things that all look like intentional damage.

Hythe was vandalised so frequently that Greater Anglia installed anti-vandalism cages over the departure boards. In this case it's an area with low-cost housing so it attracts some dodgy people. These are the kinds of people who attempt to get through barriers without scanning so they can refund their tickets after. It's pretty obvious when they're buying two singles!!

Agency staff are a disaster. They have no idea of customer service, and in my experience are unsuited to any work that involved dealing with people. I suppose they are cheaper than proper railway staff, and that is all that matters these days.

You'd be surprised. Ontrak agency staff who man gatelines get paid quite a bit more than TOC staff, plus they easily get away with 2-hour breaks and showing up late. On the flip side, I've also met some fantastic agency staff who do better customer service than any TOC staff I've met.

Agency staffing comes with a lot of problems though, mainly around service/location knowledge. Someone pulled 30-odd miles away to give customer service at another station isn't going to know everything... such as how to check when when the last train arrives!

 

[TUC]

You have to be more explicit than that.

There was another example (I forgot where) where the last train had indeed arrived and gone.

The penultimate train however was very late, later than the last train, and...

There is such a thing as to what's a reasonable amount of initiative to expect a member of staff to use.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 7 Dec 2025 ==

Someone pulled 30-odd miles away to give customer service at another station isn't going to know everything... such as how to check when when the last train arrives!

The same ways anyone else does? There are multiple apps and sites.

 

[Simon75]

TVMs that accept cash

Some like Kidsgrove are outside the station

 

[Skiddaw]

Agency staffing comes with a lot of problems though, mainly around service/location knowledge. Someone pulled 30-odd miles away to give customer service at another station isn't going to know everything... such as how to check when when the last train arrives!

It's a bit fundamental though isn't it? I'd have thought knowing how to check when the last train is due should be an essential requirement surely?

 

[GLC]

The one thing guaranteed to get a guards back up is to instruct them to do something which is not part of their duties, ask and you would get 99%cooperation in a situation like this, say to the crew, you will have to hang about for half an hour and help sort things out and you may not get the desired response.

Quite right. A guard should be well within their rights to decline to free passengers from a locked station, as that should not be their problem !

 

[35B]

Quite right. A guard should be well within their rights to decline to free passengers from a locked station, as that should not be their problem !

The problem is that, regardless of whether it is part of their job description, staff on site at the time of the incident are the employees of the company that is causing people to be imprisoned against their will. By declining to be involved, they expose themselves to much wider liability because they are present.

 

[TUC]

Quite right. A guard should be well within their rights to decline to free passengers from a locked station, as that should not be their problem !

On a human/decency level, with anyone who sees others locked in a station it is their problem.

 

[sharpener]

Which would be illegal Fire Exits have to be clear and accessible.

If there was a fire, and all the exits were locked without a means of escaping, then Northern would be criminally prosecuted under the Fire Safety Order

As later stated the issue is that more people arrived on a later train and a station with no ppl and "not in use" suddenly became so again.

When I worked backstage in the theatre (where there is a long history of lethal fires and hence a long tradition of fire precautions) the emergency exits were secured overnight by padlocked chains. But while members of the public were in the building the chains were on display on a shadow board for the fire inspectors to see, to confirm they had been removed from the doors.

So it is possible the emergency exit was locked out of hours without (usually) contravening the law.

Quite right. A guard should be well within their rights to decline to free passengers from a locked station, as that should not be their problem !

Not really relevant here, the driver and guard of the incoming train stayed for half an hour until the pax were let out and were praised (rightly IMV) for doing so, the notion of public service was clearly in their heads if not the hapless security guard's. But piss-poor of the ToC trying to pass the blame.

 

[IanMac]

That's an interesting point. I've never been to Hartlepool so I don't know about the information displays there; but I do know about Peterborough which is a bigger station and used to have a smallish arrivals indicator. But a year or so that was removed to expand the already large space available for departure details. So at Peterborough there is no arrival information on display, and if a third party contractor were locking up the station he/she would have no way of knowing whether all the due arrivals had arrived or not.

Added to which it's quite annoying if you are meeting someone off an arriving train and you don't know how to look up arrivals information on any device you may have to hand.

 

[skyhigh]

and if a third party contractor were locking up the station he/she would have no way of knowing whether all the due arrivals had arrived or not.

At the very least, they could check RTT and see.

Alternatively they could be provided with a phone number for control and told to phone to see if the station can be locked up.

To say they have no way of knowing if all trains had arrived is simply incorrect.

 

[TUC]

There is a wider issue here, regardless of whether it is internal or external staff carrying out the work, shouldn't checking that all trains have arrived be a standard part of locking-up procedures?

 

[norbitonflyer]

Could the last train not have stopped. On the basis of a message to the train crew, or standard practice when late. The passengers could have been taxied back or forward at the railways expense. Delay repay would also be paid. Nobody locked in and nobody having to stay behind after work.

Not so easy when Hartlepool was the final stop. Skip stopping is one thing - but in most cases anyone who wanted the stop and muissed the announcement will just leave at the next stop. Persuading everyone to leave the train at Horden (the penultimate stop) would have been difficult.

 

[Cell2025]

That's an interesting point. I've never been to Hartlepool so I don't know about the information displays there; but I do know about Peterborough which is a bigger station and used to have a smallish arrivals indicator. But a year or so that was removed to expand the already large space available for departure details. So at Peterborough there is no arrival information on display, and if a third party contractor were locking up the station he/she would have no way of knowing whether all the due arrivals had arrived or not.

Added to which it's quite annoying if you are meeting someone off an arriving train and you don't know how to look up arrivals information on any device you may have to hand.

At the very least, they could check RTT and see.

Alternatively they could be provided with a phone number for control and told to phone to see if the station can be locked up.

To say they have no way of knowing if all trains had arrived is simply incorrect.

Assuming that the story is correct two members of one of the passenger's family were on the platform, awaiting her arrival, and they told the contractor who ignored them (twice?) and told them to get off the platform so that he could lock up.

I made the point earlier that something didn't ring true about what allegedly went on, but that didn't gain any traction. I still think it weird that the family member allegedly didn't ring the passenger and just meekly left the station and allowed the premises to be locked up without engaging the contractor further.

 

[sharpener]

Added to which it's quite annoying if you are meeting someone off an arriving train and you don't know how to look up arrivals information on any device you may have to hand.

Cambridge has a big enough Arrivals board. But the entries are cleared too quickly so, particularly at times of disruption, if you are a bit late meeting someone you cannot tell if their train has already arrived or not. Why can't they be left up until they fall off the listing naturally? RTT to the rescue but not everyone will know.

 

[Ellwill]

Agency staff are a disaster. They have no idea of customer service, and in my experience are unsuited to any work that involved dealing with people. I suppose they are cheaper than proper railway staff, and that is all that matters these days.

Speaking as someone that's been sitting in a customer service talent pool for nearly a year, for a station that makes liberal use of agency staff for gateline duties, I'm very much inclined to agree. Their role seems primarily to be as a deterrent for antisocial behaviour and assistance with revenue protection; Customer service and general rail service knowledge very much an afterthought...

 

[Tetchytyke]

I do know that some Northern stations that get locked up are done by an agency contractor who essentially works a night shift patrolling between multiple stations. They are given a set time to lock up certain stations and then patrol - usually in a car provided by agency.

That's my understanding too. The agency staff member is given a list of places they have to be and a list of times when they have to be there. So unless they receive instructions to the contrary, that is exactly what they will do. And they will be monitored to make sure they stick to that timetable.

Knowing how agency staff are treated by their agencies, showing any sort of initiative is unlikely to be well received by their employer. It won't be a thank you for waiting in Hartlepool for the last train, it will be a bollocking because they were late to their next call. And that's assuming they even knew that either a) the train was going to be late and b) that Northern had not made alternative arrangements.

Which is precisely why I asked where Northern's control were in all of this.

 

[sharpener]

The agency staff member is given a list of places they have to be and a list of times when they have to be there.

Knowing how agency staff are treated by their agencies, showing any sort of initiative is unlikely to be well received by their employer.

But having been alerted to the actual situation by the two teenage girls waiting for their mother you would think to cover his own backside the security patrol would have alerted his own office before moving on to the next place to visit, instead he seems to have dismissed it with no action taken at all.

Presumably he is provided with a number to call if he discovers an irregularity at the premises he visits, or wot is point? A lone patrol cannot be expected to confront burglars or put out a fire, particularly if he is on a tight schedule.

 

[Mcr Warrior]

It won't be a thank you for waiting in Hartlepool for the last train, it will be a bollocking because they were late to their next call.

Next call? Where else would they be going at just past half eleven? Home, perhaps?!

 

[Tetchytyke]

Next call? Where else would they be going at just past half eleven? Home, perhaps?!

Security guards on these types of contracts are often on night shift.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 8 Dec 2025 ==

But having been alerted to the actual situation by the two teenage girls waiting for their mother you would think to cover his own backside the security patrol would have alerted his own office before moving on to the next place to visit, instead he seems to have dismissed it with no action taken at all.

Teenagers are famously reliable witnesses and would never ever lie about why they are hanging around a railway station at eleven o'clock at night.

 

[Horizon22]

Next call? Where else would they be going at just past half eleven? Home, perhaps?!

To lock up the next station, potentially.

 

[sharpener]

Next call? Where else would they be going at just past half eleven? Home, perhaps?!

All manner of places: schools, public buildings, industrial estates, entertainment venues. Either to physically lock up or to check the place is still secure by walking around the outside and rattling the front door.

Anyone remember those little die-cast boxes you would see on the wall, each held an individual "key" which was inserted into a portable machine that recorded the time at every waypoint on a security patrol's route? (I expect there was also a recognised way of cheating this system, there usually is! At one stage I worked on the first digital tachographs for HGVs; the regulations were a nightmare, being written for circular paper-based records.)

 

[Mcr Warrior]

To lock up the next station, potentially.

Which would be where exactly at that time of the evening?

 

[sharpener]

Teenagers are famously reliable witnesses and would never ever lie about why they are hanging around a railway station at eleven o'clock at night.

True, but what I was suggesting was a simple backside-covering measure in case (as it turned out) that they were right.

Also as they were girls there might have been a welfare issue (cf Rochdale).

 

[Horizon22]

Which would be where exactly at that time of the evening?

Was just a theory as I did say "potentially". The staff member the company works for may also have a contract that isn't Northern.

 

[Tetchytyke]

Which would be where exactly at that time of the evening?

All sorts of places, it may well be that the security guard(s) in question don't just have Northern railway stations as part of their rota. Especially as Hartlepool is, AFAIK, one of the few stations in that part of the world which is actually locked up at night. Most of the unstaffed stations in the area are just left open all night.

Anyone remember those little die-cast boxes you would see on the wall, each held an individual "key" which was inserted into a portable machine that recorded the time at every waypoint on a security patrol's route?

They still use them AFAIK, but it's all a lot more electronic than it used to be. Key fobs on readers, that sort of thing. Or even just a GPS tracker on the car.

True, but what I was suggesting was a simple backside-covering measure in case (as it turned out) that they were right.

True, but equally I can see why a guard would take the view that if it were the case then their employer or Northern control would have told them.

 

[mpthomson]

Which would be where exactly at that time of the evening?

The staff member may not be solely locking stations, he may also have other non-rail related duties to carry out that are also time specific.

 

[fandroid]

Assuming that the story is correct two members of one of the passenger's family were on the platform, awaiting her arrival, and they told the contractor who ignored them (twice?) and told them to get off the platform so that he could lock up.

I made the point earlier that something didn't ring true about what allegedly went on, but that didn't gain any traction. I still think it weird that the family member allegedly didn't ring the passenger and just meekly left the station and allowed the premises to be locked up without engaging the contractor further.

I'm not going to read the Northern Echo story again, but I remember, in the article, the girls' mother saying that they had phoned her to say that they'd been removed from the station. As for "meekly", they did approach the security guard twice. Were they supposed to then refuse the instruction and cling to the seats? (and potentially get locked in themselves!). It strikes me that they absolutely did the sensible thing - tried (twice) to get the station to remain unlocked, phoned the passenger on the train, left the station but remained outside to help from there if needed.

 

[norbitonflyer]

I'm not going to read the Northern Echo story again, but I remember, in the article, the girls' mother saying that they had phoned her to say that they'd been removed from the station. As for "meekly", they did approach the security guard twice. Were they supposed to then refuse the instruction and cling to the seats? (and potentially get locked in themselves!). It strikes me that they absolutely did the sensible thing - tried (twice) to get the station to remain unlocked, phoned the passenger on the train, left the station but remained outside to help from there if needed.

What would have happened if they had refused to leave? Surely the worst that would happen is that the security man would call the police - by the time they arrived the train would probably have come anyway, and even if it hadn't, the police would have been more likely to listen to the girls and/or be able to contact Control to find out if a train really was coming.

RTT shows the train in question was 12 minutes late at Brockley Whins and 28 at Sunderland, having had to follow a T&W metrotrain that should have been behind it. This meant that at the time it should have been at hartlepool it was still only at Sunderland

 

[Falcon1200]

Which is precisely why I asked where Northern's control were in all of this.

The question would surely be what laid down procedure, if any, is there for Northern Control to follow in circumstances such as this?