Trains which depart earlier than scheduled

[chorleyjeff]

I'm sure that company-provided timepieces don't gain/lose time, but when setting an analogue watch based on another analogue timepiece you can easily be a couple minutes out without realising it. Even if setting time between a two digital devices, unless they both show seconds you can be up to a minute out.

Really?
On our superbly run railway?
What other ingenious excuse can you come up with?

 

[najaB]

Really?
On our superbly run railway?
What other ingenious excuse can you come up with?

It's much more likely that the guard's watch is a couple of minutes wrong than that they deliberately choose to leave early. But I suppose that wouldn't fit in with the world-view that TOCs are staffed exclusively by *******s who try to screw the customer over at every possible opportunity.

 

[Minilad]

Come on !
Even cheap digital watches are accurate
I suppose there is the usual knee jerk reaction to any slight criticism of railway staff to be taken into account.
If a couple of minutes is neither here nor there why would a Northern train set off from Preston just as passengers with luggage have just reached its platform after dashing from the platform where the Virgin train had arrived late? A thirty second wait would have allowed us to get on and avoid a long wait on a cold dark Preston Station.

Or the fact that very occasionally someone makes a mistake. Misread the job card for example. Or any one of a dozen reasons why something like this can happen. But I guess you are perfect and have never made a slight error

 

[bb21]

Going around in circles again.