Lots of us suspect (and anecdotal evidence would support this) that the standard response to any complaint, regardless of how contrived, malicious, downright stupid, or due to the passenger being caught in breach of either NRCoC or bylaws, is to apologise.
It's called "being mindful of the business reputation", I have been told.
Yes, I wouldn't be at all surprised if this was the case. It's seen as being unnecessarily rude to call someone contrived, malicious or stupid, even when it is true.
I've been told that FGW twitter now has a stock reply along the lines of "We don't discuss staff complaints here, please email on" etc.
Quite right too.
I agree. It is a private matter between complainant, employer and employee and is no one else's business.
I would never post details of any complaint in a public place, except under the most general terms long after it had been resolved.
Before twitter these kind of complaints were not made as twitter provides people with the ability to tweet immediately before thinking through what they were saying. In the 'old days' people would get home intending to write in to complain and then think through exactly what happened and decide against it or just decide that they actually can't be bothered writing a letter etc. I have actually seen numerous twitter accounts on which every single tweet is a complaint to either a train company, supermarket or broadband provider and all seem to be fairly weak complaints. It wouldn't surprise me if companies see these accounts as serial complainers and attention seekers and take them less seriously.
Yes, twitter has provided an instant 'release valve' for people's frustrations, as has the internet as a whole to a lesser extent.
It has also provided a way that people can rant to their heart's content and feel important, as though being able to potentially tell a lot of people of their problems will make them go away.
The net effect of all this is that there is an awful lot of pointless drivel (whihc one may argue was the purpose of twitte rin the first place!) that, hopefully, will be treated in the most appropriate manner and simply get ignored.
I saw a good tweet on the FCC feed this morning complaining that its dangerous for the driver to let so many people cram onto the 'dangerously overcrowded' train (yes, so dangerous that people continued risking their lives by forcing their way onboard!) The twitter guy at FCC replied that the driver wasn't forcing people to get on (it is their own choice to board) and the tweeter responded that the driver was encouraging them by making announcements to move down etc. I'm not really sure what he wanted the driver to do about it and quite why he couldn't work out that its the passengers cramming themselves on to the train that were creating the 'dangerous' over crowding. If they felt that unsafe they could choose not to board...
I cna only presume that this person wa salready on the train, and objected to sharing his space with so many other travellers. In any case, this is the sort of tweet that I personally would be happy to see ignored!
My booking office staff will often recieve a card or a nice letter direct to the booking office praising them if they have gone out of their way and maybe a few things at christmas which of course I shouldnt know about but I'm not a b-stard so I let it go as I think its nice - but any booze has to be refused obvisouly until they are off work and out the station premises.
We used to get soem chocolates or some such small thing from certain happy passengers in Reading (yes, there ar ehappy passengers in Reading, or at least there were!!)
Any praise we get through our custoer services centre are always passed on as its the right thing to do and it shows the staff that people do appreciate them, especially some of the grief they have to take so its nice for them and does make their day a bit brighter I hope. And a copy will always go on their file
A good manager will always do this. Not so good managers will not see staff praise or compliments as a priority.
But it certainly does help memebrs of staff to feel valued and appreciated
Always worth contacting the TOC about issues like this. Maybe the clerk gave you the day return by mistake - even though they did ask you - because at times some just go into auto mode and dont think about what they are selling.
Its no excuse, but they are human too and when you are sat there punting out travelcards in the main for a good 3/4 hours when something else comes along it does trip them up.
Spot on! Even I used to make the odd mistake
