Surly greeting at Liverpool Southparkway - TOD collection

[riceuten]

It is many years since I was ticket office staff (1978-84), and I did (honestly) try to be polite at all times, but it was depressing having to deal with the Great British Public for 8 hours or longer with many seemingly never having been taught to say please, thank you or excuse me; 'what' was more often their way of asking for a clarification. And not giving the answer the passenger expected could be fun too, I once had a lit cigarette flicked at me. Not that this excuses the rude behaviour described in the OP of course, but repeated interaction with the public can be demoralising.

I worked in a housing office - numerous ones, actually, and answering the phone to tenants and residents. Yes, the Great British Public (GBP) leave a lot to be desired, and get angry and abusive at the drop of a hat. Amongst the reasons I've seen personally (this is but a soupcon) where a customer has become irate and abusive

* refusing someone with thousands of pounds of arrears a right to buy application ("I will pay you off when I sell the house...")
* someone drunkenly stagger in at 4.45pm declaring they were homeless, and then refusing the temporary accommodation offered. Apparently we have a cache of ready to let one bedroom houses of a Friday evening
* refusing to evict a tenant so that they could move in next door to "look after their mum". The neighbour concerned was adequately housed, had zero arrears and no history of bad behaviour - the applicant just wanted us to move them out so they could be close to their parent.

Amongst the reasons I have people at the station kick off verbally and abusively

* refusing to allow someone to cut into the queue when the previous customer didn't want this to happen
* refusing to refund a advance purchase ticket...the day after its validity expired
* refusing to sell a child rate ticket (only) to someone in their 40s-50s with no child apparent
* not selling someone an off peak ticket...at 7.30am in the morning (the ticket machine at the time would not actually allow the staff member to sell one)

In these circumstances, you can understand people being cynical and jaded.

 

[mrd269697]

This was a very isolated instance. The staff in my local booking office at Cressington are a proper cheery bunch.

I found the episode amusing, but I can't imagine it would have been much fun if it had been an elderly relative instead of me! Maybe they would have been marginally more engaging?

Glad it’s an isolated instance. Yeah the staff at Cressy are great.

 

[Northerngirl]

I've also had some less than brilliant interactions with the staff at parkway, most recently I walked through the open ticket barriers, only to be chased by someone who rather rudely asked something like "do you have a ticket", maybe there's just some particularly miserable staff there

 

[david1212]

The various comments about the cost of TVM vs booking office ToD collection are interesting and highlight how in the fragmented railway system we have one part bills another for a small amount without the absurdity of ticket retailers like the Trainline who are totally independent of Network Rail, National Rail and all operators.

Directly relevant to the original post the fact that the booking office cost is more ought not to be relevant to the attitude of the staff. If instructed to do so at most should be a polite comment advising that the preferred method of ToD collection is from the TVM.

 

[nanstallon]

I worked in a housing office - numerous ones, actually, and answering the phone to tenants and residents. Yes, the Great British Public (GBP) leave a lot to be desired, and get angry and abusive at the drop of a hat. Amongst the reasons I've seen personally (this is but a soupcon) where a customer has become irate and abusive

* refusing someone with thousands of pounds of arrears a right to buy application ("I will pay you off when I sell the house...")
* someone drunkenly stagger in at 4.45pm declaring they were homeless, and then refusing the temporary accommodation offered. Apparently we have a cache of ready to let one bedroom houses of a Friday evening
* refusing to evict a tenant so that they could move in next door to "look after their mum". The neighbour concerned was adequately housed, had zero arrears and no history of bad behaviour - the applicant just wanted us to move them out so they could be close to their parent.

Amongst the reasons I have people at the station kick off verbally and abusively

* refusing to allow someone to cut into the queue when the previous customer didn't want this to happen
* refusing to refund a advance purchase ticket...the day after its validity expired
* refusing to sell a child rate ticket (only) to someone in their 40s-50s with no child apparent
* not selling someone an off peak ticket...at 7.30am in the morning (the ticket machine at the time would not actually allow the staff member to sell one)

In these circumstances, you can understand people being cynical and jaded.

The Great British Public are pigs; it's all about I, me and myself. But it doesn't excuse taking it out on others after a difficult customer exchange.

 

[childwallblues]

To be fair I'm not surprised at bad service from a Merseyrail booking office. Surprised you didn't get "Yer'll af'ter go ter Laime Stsreets fer dat". They really do like promoting the idea of their own closure at times.

That said, the advertisement that the booking offices do it is really aimed at their stations that don't have connected TVMs, ie most of them. South Parkway has a Northern TVM for that purpose. Of course no excuse for rudeness.

Sorry booking office staff at South Parkway do not talk like that. I know because I use the office at least once a week and they do not give a bad service.

People are choosing online banking in droves, which means branches become uneconomic. This is happening all over the industry, and a bank whose business model was branch banking (Metro Bank) has hardly done well out of it.

This is unfortunate for technophobes, but technophobes are quite literally dying off (as the vast majority of them are elderly) and so the branch banking market is getting smaller still.

See also ticket sales (per the thread) - I was at Leeds the weekend before last, and I saw one person use the booking office and nobody use the TVMs in the time I was there. Where permitted (Merseyside based yellow-painted Luddites and TfL aside) people are choosing online methods of purchase in droves.

Count me in as a Luddite because I love Merseyrail. You have a nasty habit of bring derogatory to Merseysiders for their love of a rail system that is the envy of the UK.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Count me in as a Luddite because I love Merseyrail. You have a nasty habit of bring derogatory to Merseysiders for their love of a rail system that is the envy of the UK.

Is it? I'd take London Underground 20 times over.

It's not terrible, but it does live in about 1975 with gross overstaffing and an archaic approach to ticketing, which is unnecessarily costing the Merseyside taxpayer a fortune while being inferior to modern sales methods.

It also isn't friendly in the way it was in the 80s and 90s, rather it has become quite officious at times.

 

[Krokodil]

Is it? I'd take London Underground 20 times over.

It's still one of the best systems in the country outside of London. Hopefully contactless ticketing will come soon.

 

[8A Rail]

Is it? I'd take London Underground 20 times over.

It's not terrible, but it does live in about 1975 with gross overstaffing and an archaic approach to ticketing, which is unnecessarily costing the Merseyside taxpayer a fortune while being inferior to modern sales methods.

It also isn't friendly in the way it was in the 80s and 90s, rather it has become quite officious at times.

I have found the greater majority of staff on the Merseyrail system including those at Liverpool South Parkway station always approachable and friendly unlike some of the travelling public!

Working in a 'retail / travelling' environment especially face to face, which may be strange to some people is NOT the easiest environment to work in and in some ways you got to go into 'mode' to get through the shift and importantly do not take things personally either when there are problems / issues to solve. However, what the travelling public tend to forget, we are human too, we also have good, bad and indifferent days but we are not allowed to show it! In some ways the travelling people expect every employee to be absolutely perfect with them including providing empathy and sympathy to their personal issues / problems but never the other way around, as the staff have got to put a 'face' on as well as providing the right answers they (travelling public) wish to hear which a little impossible. May be on occasions, if some of the travelling public show a little more latitude and respect to the staff, then they may find their journey may be a little less fraught.

Likewise I find the Merseyrail staffing levels very much in line with 2023 too, minimal were necessary with some of the busier stations with more staff which is what you would expect, so I am not sure if that is still 1975 then as I would say it has improved!

As for being 'officious', I think you will find that anywhere in the UK sadly because the world has changed considerably were health and safety dominates, along with some people needing guidance because they have no common sense or if they do have some, don't know how to use it sadly. However, I would acknowledge on the odd occasion it does happen but again it is NOT a Merseyrail thing, it happens with other TOC's around the country too.

As for the 'ticketing', I would in a couple of area's acknowledge there needs to be improvements especially 'app' wise but generally speaking every other way is no different to the rest of the UK network.

 

[Deafdoggie]

As someone who doesn't live in Merseyside, I'd say the system is okay, but nothing to write home about. If I lived in Merseyside I'd be appalled at what it costs me and the fact you can't buy proper through tickets onto the rest of the UK rail system and are lumbered with a paper ticket.
There always seem plenty of staff, but none of them actually seem to do anything. The one time I needed to buy a ticket from a ticket office they sold me the wrong one.

 

[mrd269697]

Is it? I'd take London Underground 20 times over.

It's not terrible, but it does live in about 1975 with gross overstaffing and an archaic approach to ticketing, which is unnecessarily costing the Merseyside taxpayer a fortune while being inferior to modern sales methods.

It also isn't friendly in the way it was in the 80s and 90s, rather it has become quite officious at times.

I also notice you mock Merseyrail staff accents a lot. Not a good look.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I also notice you mock Merseyrail staff accents a lot. Not a good look.

I'm guessing you don't know where I'm actually from, and thus understand the principle that it is valid to (light heartedly) mock things that also apply to yourself.

I grew up with Merseyrail, and sadly it's not now the friendly little operation it once was - though to be fair the "Lime St" thing was certainly in operation back then too! (Some small booking office staff would do things like APEX tickets by phoning through to a booking office that had a CRS terminal then handwriting the ticket, but quite a few were too lazy).

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

a rail system that is the envy of the UK.

What on earth is that, because it certainly isn't Merseyrail?

 

[Bletchleyite]

What on earth is that, because it certainly isn't Merseyrail?

To be fair it's probably the envy of people who have to put up with stuff like the decidedly rough Leeds based Northern operation or the east Manchester locals, particularly in the Pacer days (though now they're mostly 195s they aren't as bad). I'm not sure I'd swap Metrolink or the T&W Metro for it though, they're all broadly similar with their own upsides and downsides.

However I'd in a flash trade the more pointless small booking offices (e.g. Aughton Park) for a decently featured TVM, e-ticket acceptance and contactless. Perhaps sense will be seen on this.

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

I'm guessing you don't know where I'm actually from, and thus understand the principle that it is valid to (light heartedly) mock things that also apply to yourself.

Unfortunately a lot of the time these days, when one wishes to weaken another's point and has limited valid points, one will often resort to looking for ways to suggest that point is offensive, even when it is quite clearly ridiculous to suggest so.

To be fair it's probably the envy of people who have to put up with stuff like the decidedly rough Leeds based Northern operation or the east Manchester locals, particularly in the Pacer days (though now they're mostly 195s they aren't as bad). I'm not sure I'd swap Metrolink or the T&W Metro for it though, they're all broadly similar with their own upsides and downsides.

Potentially so, but to suggest that the overcrowded, short-formed, dark and dingy, and currently extremely unreliable Merseyrail network is "the envy of the UK," alongside high frequency and capacious networks such as Thameslink, London Overground and Underground, Elizabeth line and yes, potentially Metrolink too, is laughable.

 

[Mag_seven]

OK, it looks like we have reached the end point of this thread. Thanks everyone.