SWR Guard and a customer with Aspergers

[DarloRich]

Hence why the policy should be "only in writing", and authorised staff should be issued with pads for providing such authority, and this policy and the form it will take should be publicised on clear posters on every platform and at every barrier line.

Indeed.

 

[ComUtoR]

Regardless of the rights and wrongs of the ticketing issue, I hope they nail the guard for their social media use. If my staff talked about clients on Facebook I'd be firing them for gross misconduct.

I do hope you aren't serious. Considering this is a forum where staff regularly help out and contribute, answer questions etc. We are breaking our social media policies. Should we all no longer post?

 

[pemma]

Of course you can say anything you like about the staff....

In any industry there's going to be some less than polite customers. The customer facing staff should know how to react appropriately in such situations.

 

[pemma]

So a ticket can be upgraded by a ticket checker on the gateline without any form of endorsement or other documentation? That is a blaggers' charter!

Surely guards should have a way of making contact with station staff if they feel it's necessary? If they don't then there's a lot of different scenarios where they'd just have to take the passenger's word for it e.g. problem taking card payments at station or ticket office temporarily unstaffed.

 

[AlterEgo]

As it happens, I favour a pro-customer approach. I've been working on the railways since 2010, starting in a job where I had revenue protection duties and have never once been in trouble for being too fair to passengers. Sometimes you give the benefit of the doubt, rather than treating everybody as a chancer who should be chinged up or reprimanded to the max. I issued Penalty Fares rather than UFNs but the matter remained between the TOC and passenger, not to be posted about online from the perspective of a member of staff.

Indeed. The job is as easy as you want to make it. It’s easier for everyone to apply a little benefit of the doubt.

 

[AlterEgo]

I do hope you aren't serious. Considering this is a forum where staff regularly help out and contribute, answer questions etc. We are breaking our social media policies. Should we all no longer post?

There’s clearly a difference between answering industry questions and slagging a specific customer off on Facebook.

 

[Puffing Devil]

Hence why the policy should be "only in writing", and authorised staff should be issued with pads for providing such authority, and this policy and the form it will take should be publicised on clear posters on every platform and at every barrier line.

And if permission is given incorrectly, that is an internal disciplinary matter of which the written permission is evidence; the passenger should not be charged any money nor any prosecution attempted.

This all day long. No arguments further down the line.

 

[ComUtoR]

There’s clearly a difference between answering industry questions and slagging a specific customer off on Facebook.

Not really. By posting here we are breaking policy. Using that policy to 'nail a member of staff' applies to any and all situations. The point of having a policy and disciplinary procedure is so that all can be treated equally. If one person gets disciplined because of the policy then all should be.

They should be disciplined for what they said and done, not by using the policy against them. The intent of the policy is to protect staff, passenger and TOC alike. All you are doing by 'nailing the staff' using the policy, is destroying that relationship between staff, management and passenger.

Being 'nailed' by the social media policy just puts people off from posting. Your comment just came across as another reason against contributing and trying to build that relationship between staff and the public. Anything I say that someone doesn't like means they could 'nail me with the social medial policy'

Thanks for that.

 

[LowLevel]

And what constitutes a "reasonable belief" that someone is lying? If someone falsely accused me of lying, I can assure you that I'd be persuing them. Your advice may be to get things in writing, but it is not necessary in law.

An unendorsed ticket is enough to give reasonable belief that the byelaw has been breached and the passenger is travelling without a valid ticket.

You then ask the passenger to correct that by making payment.

If they dispute it that's when you take the details and issue either an unpaid fares notice for appeal or a travel irregularity form with receipted zero fare ticket as appropriate to allow further investigation in accordance with the regulations.

To suggest that he said/she said should prevent investigation of a potential criminal offence is as daft as the suggestion that the passenger should be forced to immediately cough up over 200 quid or face removal over a disputed ticket validity.

 

[AlterEgo]

Not really. By posting here we are breaking policy. Using that policy to 'nail a member of staff' applies to any and all situations.

No, it doesn’t - the rules are there to protect the company from disrepute.

I have worked for two TOCs and neither of them had a blanket ban on posting about the railway on social media.

Most social media policies (and I have written one for a civil service department of 1000 people!) are basically common sense. Be respectful, don’t give away confidential information, nothing racist/sexist/homophobic or stuff like that.

I would be surprised if your TOC social media policy stopped you from contributing sensible posts here.

I wouldn’t be surprised if it stopped you from making abusive remarks about customers though.

All you are doing by 'nailing the staff' using the policy, is destroying that relationship between staff, management and passenger.

I didn’t mention anything about nailing anyone. I think you have me confused with another poster.

 

[ComUtoR]

I didn’t mention anything about nailing anyone. I think you have me confused with another poster.

Apologies. It was another posters comment.

 

[muz379]

No, it doesn’t - the rules are there to protect the company from disrepute.

I have worked for two TOCs and neither of them had a blanket ban on posting about the railway on social media.

Most social media policies (and I have written one for a civil service department of 1000 people!) are basically common sense. Be respectful, don’t give away confidential information, nothing racist/sexist/homophobic or stuff like that.

I would be surprised if your TOC social media policy stopped you from contributing sensible posts here.

I wouldn’t be surprised if it stopped you from making abusive remarks about customers though.
.

This is my understanding of the social media policy at the Toc I work for . You can post on social media and even discuss your job on social media . But if you discuss company confidential information , make derogatory posts about other employees of the company or customers of the company or say or do anything else that could bring the company into disrepute like racism or sexism then you will be subject to disciplinary action .
Plenty of companies now do operate employee facebook groups for employees to communicate and discuss the job so posting on social media is not the problem . Its just the content that is posted

Its only like in the mess room really , certain things that you say could end up in disciplinary action if reported . Unfortunately i have seen people think they have an absolute right to free speech which they quickly find out is not the case when at work .

 

[Morgsie]

I do not know the rules regarding the ticket situation but the guard posting on social media and trying to get the girl to sign when she cannot understand I do have issues with.

I do not know about guards training but surely equality and diversity are covered which covers all disabilities including autism spectrum disorders/conditions? If not then it should be included.

I have Aspergers by the way.

 

[Bromley boy]

Certainly when I was a young man the laws and bylaws covering rail travel overrode the more general rules on contract law. Has this explicitly been changed?

It has indeed.

And, for those who've posted otherwise, The Consumer Rights Act 2005 explicitly states that a verbal amendment to a contract is binding on the business. It is for businesses to work out how to do that, but I would have thought a good starting point would be a 100% no verbal authorties policy.

I think the bylaw issue is rather more important than the contract law issue.

If you’re on a train without a valid ticket*, this is prima facie evidence that an offence has been committed. Guards and revenue protection staff would hardly be doing their jobs properly if they accepted “the man at the ticket gate said I could get on” at face value without a bit more probing. Especially with advanced tickets where I’m sure people try it on all the time if they decide they want to take an earlier/later train than booked, for whatever reason.

If you don’t have a valid ticket arguing the toss about verbally amended contracts won’t help you if there’s no evidence you were ever given authority to be on board. It’s unlikely to help you in a Magistrates Court, either.


I’d agree with the point above that the easiest way of dealing with this would be for tickets to always be endorsed in writing.

*where one is required to be bought before boarding etc. I know this isn’t always the case.

 

[Tetchytyke]

Considering this is a forum where staff regularly help out and contribute, answer questions etc. We are breaking our social media policies. Should we all no longer post?

There is a world of difference between answering technical questions and providing insight about the industry and using Facebook to slag off a specific customer that you had a run in with.

I would be amazed if your social media policy has a blanket ban against the use of social media. What it will have is restrictions: don't slag off the company, don't slag off your colleagues, don't slag off your customers, and don't say anything racist/homophobic/polemic that will embarrass your company.

I would hope that staff members on here would be sensible enough to avoid commenting on incidents that they were directly involved in, even (especially) if these incidents have been misrepresented in the media.

As I said, I've been involved in a similar situation in my work. I did my slagging off over a quiet pint in the pub, not on Facebook.

 

[Tetchytyke]

If you don’t have a valid ticket arguing the toss about verbally amended contracts won’t help you if there’s no evidence you were ever given authority to be on board. It’s unlikely to help you in a Magistrates Court, either.

Depends on the competence of the bench.

The criminal test is "beyond reasonable doubt". If you can say who you spoke to, and when, and what the conversation included, you're probably going to be able to raise a reasonable doubt.

"The man on the platform" won't cut it. "The ginger lass, aged about 35, on the second gateline by Dunkin' Donuts at 2.50" probably will.

 

[Bromley boy]

I’d be interested to know what this guard wrote on social media.

If he complained in the abstract about the incident, but didn’t provide any identifying information (but the girls dad happened to stumble across the description and recognised it), I’d say any kind of disciplinary action would be totally out of proportion.

If specific details of the TOC, train, time etc. were given that would be different.

Something does seem a little odd about this case. How did the passenger get access to a supposedly closed staff Facebook group? Did he go looking for it or stumble across it?!

 

[[.n]]

I commute that line everyday, and in my experience the gateline staff are very unlikely to have said it was okay to travel, the most helpful they have ever been is to reluctantly say something along the lines of"ask the guard" and then let you go through. Usual answer is to to go to the ticket office and a refusal to let you through the barrier.

As a contrast I find the guards to be helpful at best, and at worst stick to the rules - which is what it sounds like happened in this case. I have sympathy for both parties based on my personal interpretation on this set of events

We'll never know both sides of the story in full, as we can see from the article in the newspaper there are a lot of inaccuracies in the story as presented.

It would be incredibly sensible as already suggested if more staff (gateline/guards/etc) use the box on the back of the ticket to convey information for the benefit of the customer and other staff.

 

[Tetchytyke]

How did the passenger get access to a supposedly closed staff Facebook group? Did he go looking for it or stumble across it?!

It's been implied further up that somebody within the group went out of their way to make sure the passenger saw it. Why? Who knows. That may not be true either, but it doesn't really matter.

Clearly the family could identify themselves, which implies it was more than a generic rant.

Nothing you say on the internet is private.

 

[TEW]

I’d be interested to know what this guard wrote on social media.

If he complained in the abstract about the incident, but didn’t provide any identifying information (but the girls dad happened to stumble across the description and recognised it), I’d say any kind of disciplinary action would be totally out of proportion.

If specific details of the TOC, train, time etc. were given that would be different.

Something does seem a little odd about this case. How did the passenger get access to a supposedly closed staff Facebook group? Did he go looking for it or stumble across it?!

There were several other parties involved. There was another passenger who witnessed the incident on the train, and complained about it at the time on Twitter. The guard then posted about the incident on Facebook, in a secret group, later in the day. Another member of the group on Facebook saw the complaints on Twitter, and replied to them stating that the guard had posted about it in said group. Yet another person, who may or may not have been a member of the secret group, but did have screenshots of the post in the group, then replied on Twitter, including the screenshots. The screenshots have been deleted from Twitter now, and the post has been deleted from Facebook. But the SWR Twitter page was aware of the post and had seen the screenshots before they were deleted.

 

[nw1]

I really recommend that you don't do that! No matter how much you lock down your profiles, it doesn't stop someone you know forwarding it on to someone else. Nothing you put on the internet is private.

IANAL so I might be talking complete rubbish, but...

Is there anything wrong with saying that some anonymous person abused or assaulted you? Since they're anonymous, you can't be accused of defaming anyone.

I agree that public naming and shaming of a person who annoyed you or even assaulted you is not good (people should not be named and shamed until proven guilty by the courts), but anonymising the incident?

 

[8J]

I can verify that what TEW has said to be correct. As I understand it, the person who allegedly reported the post is not a SWR employee. The group is open to current railway staff from all TOCs and Network Rail, former railway staff and heritage railway staff. Sadly I don't think the vetting process on this group was upto scratch and people were on there that were enthusiasts as opposed to staff.

I find it abhorrent that someone who is supposedly railway staff should potentially land someone in trouble for an off the cuff remark on Facebook...

 

[matt_world2004]

IANAL so I might be talking complete rubbish, but...

Is there anything wrong with saying that some anonymous person abused or assaulted you? Since they're anonymous, you can't be accused of defaming anyone.

I agree that public naming and shaming of a person who annoyed you or even assaulted you is not good (people should not be named and shamed until proven guilty by the courts), but anonymising the incident?

Thats my understanding the biggest identifier has usually been a rough location of where it happened.

 

[mpthomson]

I can verify that what TEW has said to be correct. As I understand it, the person who allegedly reported the post is not a SWR employee. The group is open to current railway staff from all TOCs and Network Rail, former railway staff and heritage railway staff. Sadly I don't think the vetting process on this group was upto scratch and people were on there that were enthusiasts as opposed to staff.

I find it abhorrent that someone who is supposedly railway staff should potentially land someone in trouble for an off the cuff remark on Facebook...

It's a remark that appears to be against the social media policy of his employer. There is no such thing as a private remark on Facebook or any other social media system. If you don't want to be in trouble for what you say on these sites, then don't say things that may get you into trouble, it really is that simple.

 

[8J]

Do you happen to know the social media policy for his employer?? Because I do....

 

[robk23oxf]

Making derogatory comments about a passengers on social media is definitely a no-no, just not worth the risk. Whenever I deal with someone who says 'I was authorised to use this ticket' and there is no evidence that was the case then I will ask them to pay the correct fare, retain the ticket and contact customer service who can refund it if necessary. At the end of the day it's not worth being caught letting people travel without the correct ticket.

Unfortunately in this case I think the company will come down hard on the guard. While the guard should be careful what he puts on social media and avoid bringing the company into disrepute, the company will no doubt follow the 'customer is always right' principle (biggest load of rubbish ever in my opinion). I was once told off by my manager for telling a passenger to leave my bus after they shouted racist abuse at a number of other passengers, I'm sure the other passengers would've been delighted to put up with that for the rest of their journey. At the end of the day though companies don't want to deter repeat custom and want to keep everyone happy.

 

[Bromley boy]

Depends on the competence of the bench.

The criminal test is "beyond reasonable doubt". If you can say who you spoke to, and when, and what the conversation included, you're probably going to be able to raise a reasonable doubt.

"The man on the platform" won't cut it. "The ginger lass, aged about 35, on the second gateline by Dunkin' Donuts at 2.50" probably will.

True. You know a lot more than I do about these cases, having seen some of your posts on the disputes and prosecutions forum.

Presumably where the TOC has details of the passenger and a statement, they conduct an investigation and make a choice of whether to prosecute. If there was CCTV showing a conversation with gateline staff, even though no audio, as you say this would partially corroborate the story so they presumably wouldn’t bother to prosecute.

Presumably they would retain the right to pursue a civil claim for the unpaid fare (with the lower “balance of probabilities” threshold rather than “beyond a reasonable doubt”). Would they bother pursuing this in practice, if only to make an example?

 

[al78]

Unfortunately i have seen people think they have an absolute right to free speech which they quickly find out is not the case when at work .

Ah yes the old "freedom of speech" cliche.

This just about sums up what freedom of speech does, and doesn't mean.

https://www.newstatesman.com/2015/11/free-speech-delusion

 

[AlterEgo]

Do you happen to know the social media policy for his employer?? Because I do....

I bet it doesn’t let you slag off customers on Facebook.

 

[AlterEgo]

Ah yes the old "freedom of speech" cliche.

This just about sums up what freedom of speech does, and doesn't mean.

https://www.newstatesman.com/2015/11/free-speech-delusion

“by Laurie Penny”!

Saw that at the top and didn’t read it.