Redundancy

[Love life]

Do you personally think that redundancies are going to happen on the railway in the near future
Do you think that Ticket Offices will close?
Do you think they will repurpose staff and retain people or make them redundant?
All up for discussion

 

[Neatro]

I think station staff will be reduced especially as more electronic payment methods come into place.

But On board wise I don't think will change that much

 

[Islineclear3_1]

Redundancies are inevitable in any industry. it's just "when".

However, I can't see self-driving trains on the mainline any time during the rest of my lifetime...

 

[RJ]

Some people are holding out for it - others will probably have to retrain for roles that are in keeping with technological advancements.

I take each day as it comes.

 

[Mag_seven]

Do you personally think that redundancies are going to happen on the railway in the near future

They already have happened for many.

 

[winks]

Ticket Offices are about to get decimated. Public aren’t aware and won’t realise untill it’s too late. Most of the clerks will be offered redundancy or redeployment.

 

[Horizon22]

Ticket Offices are about to get decimated. Public aren’t aware and won’t realise untill it’s too late. Most of the clerks will be offered redundancy or redeployment.

Or the public aren't aware and then won't care. Sure some will, and I'm very much generalising but I imagine many younger generations haven't been to one in many years.

 

[dk1]

As traincrew some of us are gagging to be offered the chance of voluntary redundancy. Sadly however in our grade there is very little hope of that happening.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 4 Oct 2022 ==

As always though, those in jobs going will normally always be offered something else. I’ve been made redundant twice & gained financially out of it on both occasions. It’s a railway thing

 

[43066]

Do you personally think that redundancies are going to happen on the railway in the near future

Yes. They already have at Network Rail, I believe. I doubt compulsory redundancies will be made at TOCs simply because they’re so thinly staffed in most areas.

Do you think that Ticket Offices will close?

Many ticket offices will likely close over the next few years, yes.

Do you think they will repurpose staff and retain people or make them redundant?

Redeployment or voluntary redundancy for those who want it will be most likely choice for those at closing ticket offices etc.

Effectively zero chance of any form of redundancy for those in operational grades, albeit quite a few would jump at the chance!

 

[Chucky]

Ticket offices will be closed. That's guaranteed. I think at bigger stations you'll see staff redeployed to other roles but at smaller stations they'll just leave the places totally unstaffed permanently. They call it modernisation but when it's leaving places with no staff its just cuts. Ticket office is a grade traditionally represented by TSSA, the weakest and least militant of the railway unions, which is why it's an easy option for the government to go after them.

 

[185]

So many other functions in the railway haemorrhaging cash, but the ones that bring the money in should be the last to go. Financially the railway does need to slim down - you only need to open most NR & TOC job advert pages and ask what the tens of thousands of non-frontline or non-operational (£70-150K) jobs advertised actually do - 90% probably don't need to be there, often using 8 people to do the job of one person, or could be entirely replaced by technology.

Customer facing roles which assist passengers able or otherwise should always be there, and as they cost a third to a quarter of those in office jobs, they should really be the last to be axed. I often wonder if TOCs were deliberately hiring hundreds of unrequired desk staff to 'maintain next years DfT budget at this years level'.

The scam train leasing companies and contracting out anything should a high priority for the chop too.

 

[ComUtoR]

Do you personally think that redundancies are going to happen on the railway in the near future

'Redundancy' is a legal term that comes with specific caveats. The current voluntary severance scheme is not redundancy. Will there be redundancies in the true sense of the word; most likely but I'm not 100% sure. (see below)

Do you think that Ticket Offices will close?

Yes

Do you think they will repurpose staff and retain people or make them redundant?

The railway is VERY good at redeployment. Many staff members switch roles and often move sideways. I know examples where an entire role was removed but was effectively redeployed and transitioned into a new (but the same) role elsewhere. I also know examples where locations are changed and once again, staff have been redeployed.

They already have happened for many.

I'm interested. Which roles have been made 'Redundant'; considering the above. Ticket offices aside; which are very publicly getting destroyed.

 

[PupCuff]

So many other functions in the railway haemorrhaging cash, but the ones that bring the money in should be the last to go. Financially the railway does need to slim down - you only need to open most NR & TOC job advert pages and ask what the tens of thousands of non-frontline or non-operational (£70-150K) jobs advertised actually do - 90% probably don't need to be there, often using 8 people to do the job of one person, or could be entirely replaced by technology.

Customer facing roles which assist passengers able or otherwise should always be there, and as they cost a third to a quarter of those in office jobs, they should really be the last to be axed. I often wonder if TOCs were deliberately hiring hundreds of unrequired desk staff to 'maintain next years DfT budget at this years level'.

The scam train leasing companies and contracting out anything should a high priority for the chop too.

I'm afraid the reality is - certainly in TOC world - that the majority of non-frontline and non-operational management roles are still business critical, are rarely on more than a Driver's wage, and such teams (even "operational" ones) are frequently running substantially below establishment.

Additionally, don't forget that having say one person on 50k who can act as a specialist for the entire business on a given subject area is likely more cost effective than (as frequently happens) training up all the first line operational managers eg CTMs, DTMs, in that and expecting them to do it on top of everything else, and requiring a subsequent increase in their headcount.

 

[Horizon22]

I'm afraid the reality is - certainly in TOC world - that the majority of non-frontline and non-operational management roles are still business critical, are rarely on more than a Driver's wage, and such teams (even "operational" ones) are frequently running substantially below establishment.

Additionally, don't forget that having say one person on 50k who can act as a specialist for the entire business on a given subject area is likely more cost effective than (as frequently happens) training up all the first line operational managers eg CTMs, DTMs, in that and expecting them to do it on top of everything else, and requiring a subsequent increase in their headcount.

And no doubt they do “overtime” without being paid for it by regularly working +40 hours a week.

So many other functions in the railway haemorrhaging cash, but the ones that bring the money in should be the last to go. Financially the railway does need to slim down - you only need to open most NR & TOC job advert pages and ask what the tens of thousands of non-frontline or non-operational (£70-150K) jobs advertised actually do - 90% probably don't need to be there, often using 8 people to do the job of one person, or could be entirely replaced by technology.

Customer facing roles which assist passengers able or otherwise should always be there, and as they cost a third to a quarter of those in office jobs, they should really be the last to be axed. I often wonder if TOCs were deliberately hiring hundreds of unrequired desk staff to 'maintain next years DfT budget at this years level'.

The scam train leasing companies and contracting out anything should a high priority for the chop too.

This is not solely a railway thing, but people criticising roles that are well paid but not a direct operational role is an odd habit and normally means that just because the role isn’t understood fully it must therefore be unnecessary, bloated, . NR is under very strict financial constraint, so if a role iq advertised you better believe it’s required.

TOCs - and NR especially - are large organisations. To run effectively and develop they need teams dedicated to certain roles and sectors. I often make reference to the NHS; if you didn’t have “middle management” and support staff, you’d have to give that work to doctors and nurses and lower admin staff, all reducing their time to do other critical work.

If the whole business doesn’t work effectively nobody will be able to “bring in money” and it’s very simplistic to suggest that just ticket clerks can do this - you need a sales, marketing, project and performance team to do this, just off the top of my head.

 

[43066]

The scam train leasing companies and contracting out anything should a high priority for the chop too.

Rolling stock leasing is an enormous area of cost on the railway with leasing companies often able to charge extremely high rates due to the way the industry has been set up. It has been ignored as such for far too long - it’s notable that discussion of railway costs focus far more on staffing costs rather than areas such as leasing which are less well understood.

'Redundancy' is a legal term that comes with specific caveats.

Worth noting that voluntary redundancy is still redundancy as opposed to other type of dismissal, it’s just that the pool of people from whom those to be made redundant are chosen consists of volunteers. You still have various rights such as redundancy pay, right to be consulted etc.

Voluntary redundancy

www.citizensadvice.org.uk

Your employer will select the people to be made redundant from everyone who volunteered.

It’s up to your employer if they select you for redundancy. Just because you volunteered to be made redundant doesn’t mean you will be.

If you’re selected for redundancy, it’s important you get a letter from your employer confirming you’ve been made redundant.

You’ll need to show this letter to an employment tribunal later if there are any problems (for example, your employer doesn’t pay your redundancy pay).

You’ll still get any redundancy rights you’re entitled to, like time off to look for a new job. You might also be able to negotiate your notice period with your employer.

 

[185]

Vacancy : Business Intelligence Developer
Vacancy : Fatigue Risk Manager
Vacancy : Head of Resources
Vacancy : Information Governance Officer
Vacancy : Senior Digital Marketing Executive
Vacancy : Social Media Accessibility Executive
Vacancy : Transactional & Treasury Analyst
Vacancy : WCPD Contract and Compliance Manager

This is a snapshot of some of of the vacancies, live right now on the Avanti website. These are the back office (non-) jobs I'm on about, not planning, crew management, finance, HR or exec. Many of them are partial or total duplicates of existing jobs, many of them just unnecessary additional tiers of one department. It's like this week in, week out at around two thirds of the TOC's recruitment pages - some are notably 'slimmer' than others, regardless of size.

The merging of franchises into larger rail business divisions would be the only way to allow reductions the slightly more necessary back-office jobs.

 

[PupCuff]

Vacancy : Business Intelligence Developer
Vacancy : Fatigue Risk Manager
Vacancy : Head of Resources
Vacancy : Information Governance Officer
Vacancy : Senior Digital Marketing Executive
Vacancy : Social Media Accessibility Executive
Vacancy : Transactional & Treasury Analyst
Vacancy : WCPD Contract and Compliance Manager

This is a snapshot of some of of the vacancies, live right now on the Avanti website. These are the back office (non-) jobs I'm on about, not planning, crew management, finance, HR or exec. Many of them are partial or total duplicates of existing jobs, many of them just unnecessary additional tiers of one department. It's like this week in, week out at around two thirds of the TOC's recruitment pages - some are notably 'slimmer' than others, regardless of size.

The merging of franchises into larger rail business divisions would be the only way to allow reductions the slightly more necessary back-office jobs.

I'm certainly not advocating that management grades shouldn't bear their fare share of efficiencies, but swinging an axe on significant numbers of roles simply because you've formed a genuine but naïve belief that they're not required is unhelpful and will of course eventually trickle down to the front line when things that should be being done start not being done because the manager who looked after that left and wasn't replaced.

 

[RJ]

Vacancy : Business Intelligence Developer
Vacancy : Fatigue Risk Manager
Vacancy : Head of Resources
Vacancy : Information Governance Officer
Vacancy : Senior Digital Marketing Executive
Vacancy : Social Media Accessibility Executive
Vacancy : Transactional & Treasury Analyst
Vacancy : WCPD Contract and Compliance Manager

This is a snapshot of some of of the vacancies, live right now on the Avanti website. These are the back office (non-) jobs I'm on about, not planning, crew management, finance, HR or exec. Many of them are partial or total duplicates of existing jobs, many of them just unnecessary additional tiers of one department. It's like this week in, week out at around two thirds of the TOC's recruitment pages - some are notably 'slimmer' than others, regardless of size.

The merging of franchises into larger rail business divisions would be the only way to allow reductions the slightly more necessary back-office jobs.

Are these bona fide vacancies, or are they jobs that people are already doing and having to reapply for because of some sort of restructuring?

 

[Horizon22]

Vacancy : Business Intelligence Developer
Vacancy : Fatigue Risk Manager
Vacancy : Head of Resources
Vacancy : Information Governance Officer
Vacancy : Senior Digital Marketing Executive
Vacancy : Social Media Accessibility Executive
Vacancy : Transactional & Treasury Analyst
Vacancy : WCPD Contract and Compliance Manager

This is a snapshot of some of of the vacancies, live right now on the Avanti website. These are the back office (non-) jobs I'm on about, not planning, crew management, finance, HR or exec. Many of them are partial or total duplicates of existing jobs, many of them just unnecessary additional tiers of one department. It's like this week in, week out at around two thirds of the TOC's recruitment pages - some are notably 'slimmer' than others, regardless of size.

The merging of franchises into larger rail business divisions would be the only way to allow reductions the slightly more necessary back-office jobs.

Why, when TOCs are under so much financial pressure would be they be recruiting into "non-jobs" so consistently? You appear to have some sort of grudge against office workers on the railway despite the fact that your average TOC has several thousand staff and is a relatively large business ultimately. Jobs like this would exist under a new BR, GBR or even if they were larger "rail business divisions", although I take your point that this might reduce some roles, albeit only a very small number.

How do you know they are "partial or total duplicates of other jobs"? Again you seem to be coming at this with an extremely prejudiced and pre-formed opinion; a LOT happens behind the scenes that front-line staff don't always see.

As for your comment, some of the roles have got rather ridiculous wordy titles but I can see almost one or two related to "crew management" (Head of Resources and Fatigue Risk Manager - unless you don't think that fatigue needs more focus on the railway) and "finance" (Transactional & Treasury Analyst). Two or three of the others are related to IT and compliance, a necessary for any company.

Your comments are coming across as rather mis-informed and are trying to create some sort of "us and them" scenario which doesn't really exist and isn't healthy.

 

[Mainsideman]

I think station staff will be reduced especially as more electronic payment methods come into place.

But On board wise I don't think will change that much

Stations will still need gateline staff, customer assistance and dispatch staff

 

[trek]

dispatch staff

Given we're on the topic there's plenty of precident to slim those down too, especially given the number of locations where you have different TOCs, using essentially the same units and some not using platform dispatch.

The thing that will protect that role is either the stronger RMT representation protecting that role, and/or ASLEF insisting its kept.

I suspect we'll see more multi skilled platform staff, ie London Overground or MTR Elizabeth Line, where many staff retain dispatch competency for degraded dispatch but overall headcounts can be lower.

 

[Mainsideman]

Given we're on the topic there's plenty of precident to slim those down too, especially given the number of locations where you have different TOCs, using essentially the same units and some not using platform dispatch.

The thing that will protect that role is either the stronger RMT representation protecting that role, and/or ASLEF insisting its kept.

I suspect we'll see more multi skilled platform staff, ie London Overground or MTR Elizabeth Line, where many staff retain dispatch competency for degraded dispatch but overall headcounts can be lower.

Will still be required at key locations as it is at liverpool street etc…

 

[trek]

Will still be required at key locations as it is at liverpool street etc…

Why, other than union pressure? As much as I don't like giving open access as the examples, Lumo, GC and Hull Trains all self dispatch from their terminals.

And regardless it's not necessarily about removing everywhere, there is certainly scope to slim down.

 

[Horizon22]

Why, other than union pressure? As much as I don't like giving open access as the examples, Lumo, GC and Hull Trains all self dispatch from their terminals.

And regardless it's not necessarily about removing everywhere, there is certainly scope to slim down.

Do they? I’ve not across any pure self-dispatch at London terminals that doesn’t require at least some involvement from station staff.

 

[ComUtoR]

Do they? I’ve not across any pure self-dispatch at London terminals that doesn’t require at least some involvement from station staff.

Would you count Blackfriars and any of the stations through The Core as a London Terminal ?

 

[Horizon22]

Would you count Blackfriars and any of the stations through The Core as a London Terminal ?

Not in the same way I suppose - I'm considering it as a terminating platform, although I appreciate Blackfriars 3/4 does indeed have self-dispatch.

 

[Love life]

Cheers for the comments! I work in the Ticket Office and personally yes it probably does need to come to an end in the future. But also on the same hand, they need to retain/redeploy the staff that still want to work for the railway in another capacity. I wouldn't mind being redeployed into a different job role.

Taking a look at the VSS not a single person within the ticket office was offered it and on my branch line which has 10 stations, 4 staff put in for it. However, I personally think they didn't offer it because they knew based on their age they would retire even if they weren't offered it. Which was the case for 2 staff members who were not offered it but still retired and the government saved money by allowing that to happen. It was a very strategic scheme that took loads of factors into consideration.

But equally, my station is meant to have 5 permanent ticket office clerks. Yet only myself and 1 person are now left as they just simply won't recruit. I've also seen my company advertising for roles at stations which are ticket office staff but now they are only secondment positions for 12 months, so they defiantly know that the role in the next 12 months will slowly decline.

I believe any sensible idea for ticket office staff and gateline is to merge it into one where gateline could also sell tickets. As GWR do, they also have Ticket Office staff at the same time. Or, they could have us travel to different stations each week for example West Byfleet 1 day, Hook the next, and so on. So passengers could at least expect at least 1 day a week for someone to be there helping them with things they cannot do online

 

[Horizon22]

I believe any sensible idea for ticket office staff and gateline is to merge it into one where gateline could also sell tickets. As GWR do, they also have Ticket Office staff at the same time. Or, they could have us travel to different stations each week for example West Byfleet 1 day, Hook the next, and so on. So passengers could at least expect at least 1 day a week for someone to be there helping them with things they cannot do online

You would probably go one step further and have a multi-skilled “customer service” role that was able to do gateline duties, customer service and possibly dispatch (if required) as well as some ticketing duties.

The issue of course is that this would no doubt dilute some ticketing skills - which can be rather complex - although there is lots of anecdotal evidence on these forums that’s these skills are rarely challenged - which could be problematic.

I wouldn’t find it viable for it to be pot luck depending on day of the week; whatever coverage is designed should be the same hours every day (sickness / AL / absence excluded).

 

[Mainsideman]

Why, other than union pressure? As much as I don't like giving open access as the examples, Lumo, GC and Hull Trains all self dispatch from their terminals.

And regardless it's not necessarily about removing everywhere, there is certainly scope to slim down.

My toc are recruiting more for preparation to move to doo, it will certainly still be around!

 

[baz962]

Not in the same way I suppose - I'm considering it as a terminating platform, although I appreciate Blackfriars 3/4 does indeed have self-dispatch.

So that then would instead include London Overground self dispatching at Richmond, Stratford, Clapham, Watford. Forgot the Bay at Gospel Oak and the one at Willesden. Also at Barking P1. I haven't been to the new Barking Riverside so I don't know.