Even if it's not an exact science, the beep that a hazard is approaching is helpful, and not just for visually impaired passengers. I and other passengers have got out of the way of an approaching vehicle on multiple occasions. It also helps the vehicle make progress quickly with its task.
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Avanti take needless announcements to a new level
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You'd be surprised how well a visually impaired person can pin point a sound.
My point is that it's going off constantly. Quite often more than one at the same time. An alarm should be the exception, not the norm. Why should those vehicles move faster than walking speed on a busy platform? I nearly got bowled over by a vehicle that appeared from behind a building recently.
A fun variation on the hot drinks in bags announcement.....
Without a hint of irony, I had this yesterday evening - as part of the announcement that no hot drinks would be available.
For added effect, the magic words 'health and safety' were included.
Without a hint of irony, I had this yesterday evening - as part of the announcement that no hot drinks would be available.
For added effect, the magic words 'health and safety' were included.
MalaiseForever
Member
35 minutes into a journey so far with Avanti, and we’ve had three announcements from the shop. Including a long monologue about how the brown paper bags for hot drinks will save everyone from 3rd degree burns. Give it a rest!
I've never been particularly convinced of the merits of this health and safety policy. Not all operators do it and I'm not aware of a mass spilling of drinks on the trains where it's not served in a bag. But my favourite one was back in the Virgin Trains west coast days, I was a pioneer with a reusable coffee cup and despite it having a fully sealable lid to the point you could rigourously shake it upside down, the staff member proceeded to fill it with tea for me then still placed it into a bag. Naturally I just lifted it out of the bag before walking away with it, but I found it bizarre really.
It doesn't help that most bins on trains aren't segregated recycling bins. I'm not sure if people sort the waste for recycling when the train is cleaned but my guess is not, and passengers are unlikely to see that happening if so, so it just feels wasteful.
But if the policy itself isn't bad enough, having announcements about it is just a bit over the top. If actually guess that this particular announcement has been added in response to so many passengers querying the weird bag policy.
What would be the consequences of taking the drink out of the bag and walking off with it? I'd imagine that it's rather easier to walk while holding a cup of coffee than while carrying a bag containing a cup of coffee.
In my experience? None. Still polite, say thank you, etc, but the staff doesn't seem surprised if you do it.
It's probably one of those things where the risk of it spilling is greater when it's in a bag, but the consequences of it spilling may be reduced because the bag will absorb some of it (the liquid and the heat).
I'm sure spillages happen, but in my decades of train travel I don't recall ever seeing somebody spill a coffee. And if this policy was so great, the coffee shops at stations would be doing it as well.
I get that drinks spill, but like above - surely they're more prone to spill when in a bag and not being held firmly in the hand.
Or is it because if it spills when it's in the bag it's not touching skin and instead just dribbles on the carpet which is annoying but less painful than a coffee on skin burn?
Or is it because if it spills when it's in the bag it's not touching skin and instead just dribbles on the carpet which is annoying but less painful than a coffee on skin burn?
Possibly but they've had the bag policy for I think a decade and a half now, but have only relatively recently started doing announcements about the bags. I think it's a genuine safety issue they think they're fixing, but are probably sick of passengers complaining about the bags so created an announcement for it to stave off people who get a bit annoyed at the counter, especially when people are constantly being reminded in life about recycling and the bins on trains are not usually recycling-segregated, so it's just paper going to landfill probably.
I think someone somewhere has done a risk assessment and decided that a minor spill in a bag is likely to be absorbed by the paper bag, while a minor spill onto somebody wearing shorts or a short-sleeved top is minor burn territory. A major spill is probably going to cause a headache whether it's in a bag or not. The thing is, not all hot drinks on trains are actually bought on the train, meaning the majority are carried not inside a bag, so they already clearly need a policy on dealing with hot liquid burns (which is probably one of the easiest things on a first aid course!)
I am going to guess that if you brought the cup on board then it's your fault
Also, I would hope that all conductors/train managers etc are first aid trained so would be able to deal with a burn.
Well, quite.I am going to guess that if you brought the cup on board then it's your fault
Also, I would hope that all conductors/train managers etc are first aid trained so would be able to deal with a burn.
But I also think it would be my fault if I spilled a drink from the on-board buffet car, with or without the paper bag and with or without the announcement. The staff serving hot drinks could always offer a paper bag or cup holder and the passenger chooses whether to accept it or not, but I think it's a bit overkill to both have a policy that every hot drink must be served in a bag, and also to have multiple announcements about it on your journey! I'm far from a, "'elf and safety gone mad!", type, but this policy does seem a bit OTT to me, and potentially not even safer.
Train crew are first aid trained, which means they're already equipped to deal with hot drink spills yeah
Falcon1200
Established Member
I would say the opposite - The coffee cup can be hot! Plus, if buying other items they all go in the bag, which makes life easier.
Bikenbeer
Member
Provided you hold the bag by the handle directly above the coffee cup then you have a pendulum effect where the only force experienced by the liquid is in a direction perpendicular to its surface which will therefore remain flat. If you hold the cup in your hand you will be very unlikely to avoid producing a sideways force which will cause sloshing and spillage.
This product is not the same as a paper bag however, because:
- It features a non-slip base to prevent sliding
- It has a flexible finger handle to prevent sloshing
This isn't the same as a thick paper bag, where this lateral force is applied.SpillNot said:
This is a photo of an LNER paper bag as an example. I am sure Avanti's are similar but as they're just boring brown bags it's harder to find a photo! :
(nicked from this ebay listing: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/305014294559 !)
Because the handles are rigid, the lateral force SpillNot prevents is not prevented, and because it doesn't feature a non-slip base for the cup and it is twice the width of a hot drinks cup, it doesn't prevent sliding.
Also in the SpillNot promo video, they do imply that some of their maneuvers take practice. I suspect not many people practice swinging a hot drink in a paper bag round, but I suspect most people are fairly adept with carrying a cup in their hand.
And realistically if this is such a significant problem (I suspect it's not otherwise coffee shops at stations etc would also serve them in bags) there are more sensible solutions such as having a closed lid on hot drinks, just like McDonald's and other takeaway coffee places do.
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gabrielhj07
Established Member
Avanti should give us all one of these and do away with the announcements.
Do we assume that Avanti claims a unique health and safety risk for their trains which has been robustly identified and assessed? If so, it would be helpful for them to explain it. Otherwise we might think their drinks approach is just random unevidenced risk-aversion.
A thought: if I were to accidentally spill hot coffee onto a fellow passenger, and they suffered injury, would there be a case to sue? Would it boil down (sorry) to whether it was my fault (rushing/inattention) vs jolting carriage, carelessly paced suitcase etc? I’ve never worried about it before but… and if I used an LNER bag would this keep me out of jail guv?
gabrielhj07
Established Member
I suppose it would depend on whether you, the consumer, could reasonably expect a cup of coffee to be hot without having had it explained to you like a toddler.
Vexed
Member
Getting a drink from the shop (/cafe bar on LNER) is different to a trolley service as you're walking through the train with the hot drink instead of it being made at the seat. It's different to bringing your own coffee cup too as you'll be moving through the train to s seat while the train is stopped at a station.
The paper bags holding some liquid is part of it, but my understanding is that the main reason for them is when there are jolts in the track it's natural to grab onto whatever your holding or grab something else to hold onto. If you're holding a cup it's impossible to grab onto something else and instead you might subconsciously squeeze the cup itself and squash out the hot liquid. Squeezing a bag handle won't cause a spill and it's easier to use grab handles than with just a cup.
So I think they're a good idea, but how LNER does it is much better without announcements. If someone doesn't want to take the paper bag that should be their choice but they should be provided.
The paper bags holding some liquid is part of it, but my understanding is that the main reason for them is when there are jolts in the track it's natural to grab onto whatever your holding or grab something else to hold onto. If you're holding a cup it's impossible to grab onto something else and instead you might subconsciously squeeze the cup itself and squash out the hot liquid. Squeezing a bag handle won't cause a spill and it's easier to use grab handles than with just a cup.
So I think they're a good idea, but how LNER does it is much better without announcements. If someone doesn't want to take the paper bag that should be their choice but they should be provided.
Dr Hoo
Established Member
I suspect that many of these bag comments are from passengers buying a single hot drink, on its own. Plenty of others are travelling in couples or small groups. It is far less wise to walk through a lurching train with a hot drink in each hand.
Maybe the announcement should be changed to inform passengers that if they purchase more than 1 hot drink per adult, then paper bags will used to prevent full thickness burns
43096
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Or maybe cut the ear spam: don't do an announcement at all and just tell people when they buy a hot drink.Maybe the announcement should be changed to inform passengers that if they purchase more than 1 hot drink per adult, then paper bags will used to prevent full thickness burns
It's annoying, but I get the reason why they don't do this, it relies on the human in the shop telling people and the one time they don't is the one time someone kicks off about it.
I know this through my own work that often you have to have double notices/enforcement because whilst you should be able to trust a human to always do something, they often forget.
43096
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But it relies on the human in the shop to do the announcement too. Better to miss one person by not telling them than miss everyone by failing to do the announcement.
Why would they need to tell anyone unless the customer asks why their drink has just been placed in a bag? Just hand the bagged drinks over and that will be the end of it for 95%. For the other 5%: "Oh, I don't need a bag" "Sorry, I have to give it to you"
It would be good if we got someone who works at Avanti to comment as they probably know.
But at a guess for this specific announcement I'd probably say that the staff got fed up of being asked why they're putting it in a bag and potentially even getting customers being rude/obnoxious with them and so raised it with management and that's where the announcement came in. Probably by some staff survey or otherwise. I doubt they'd add the announcement without any reason or backstory as it costs to record etc.
I recall back in my retail days that cashiers regularly got frustrated with having to ask a specific question to customers and they'd get all sorts of abuse for it and in the end we put up large signs saying that it wasn't the cashier's fault, it was a requirement they asked.