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WMR/LNWR Staff shortages

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londonmidland

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I’m currently waiting at Liverpool Lime Street and it appears both the 16:33 and 17:05 services to London Euston have been cancelled due to ‘a shortage of train crew’.

The service appears to restart at Birmingham New Street and goes forward to London Euston. The same thing happened a few days ago, too.

I can understand if this was on a Sunday but this is in the week, during the evening peak.

Does anyone know why this particular part of the line seems to be affected so bad and if WMT are doing anything to resolve these issues?
 
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8J

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It has been poor for quite a while with traincrew shortages not just for this line but across the whole LNWR network.

It should be noted that the depots that cover the Liverpool line are Crewe, Wolverhampton and Birmingham New Street. I'd like to see a train crew depot open at Liverpool to help alleviate this problem but I suspect it will never happen.
 

6Gman

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1836 New St - Liverpool ( xxxx Euston) cancelled for same reason (may have run ECS to Crewe?).

1902 New St - Crewe also cancelled.

Was planning on collecting some delay repay but TfW / CC / VTWC got me home only 11 minutes later than booked despite having to change at Wolves and Stafford. :D
 

StaffsWCML

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Because they are ran by a clueless bunch of incompetents. Nothing else to it really. :lol:

It was far better as London Midlands, service has definitely deteriorated under may favourite Dutch company.

This is what happens when you put an invitation for bids that are rubbish, you attract rubbish to run a franchise.
 

David57

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I understand that there will be changes in the December timetable change 'to improve the service' on the Liverpool - Birmingham route.
Won't hold my breath....
 

Camden

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Good. December is a while away yet, and that wouldn't have worked out well for you.
 

ChiefPlanner

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A good sprinkling of cancellations on Saturday evening on the Walsall, Leamington and Cross City lines.

Good job we checked as our planned departure off Selly Oak for the 2010 VWC was one of the victims.
 

londonmidland

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Signalling problems at Birmingham New Street along with train crew shortage is causing disruption to a number of WMT services this evening.
 

londonmidland

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Yet again there are multiple cancellations from Lime Street to Euston, mainly due to a broken rail between New Street and Wolverhampton.

What I don’t understand is why there seems to be little information or tweets regarding these cancellations, and no information on ticket acceptance from Lime Street.
 

iainbhx

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Usually a handful cancelled on the Snow Hills too due to the same reason.

The Snow Hill Lines evening service has been very poor since the evening timetable came in. Not uncommon for at least one if not two diagrams to be cancelled or running late most evenings. the 18:10 from Moor Street and the 18:39 are the usual victims. If they aren't cancelled, they will probably be late. When it really gets fun is that they cancel the 18:10, run the 18:31 express to Shirley and cancel the 18:39, which means an hours worth of passengers for the inner Birmingham stations on the 19:00. They don't seem to realise that around a third of the passengers on that route use the inner stations.
 

Dr Hoo

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As always with this sort of thread it would be really helpful if anyone close to the scene could provide any background. For example, is current headcount under establishment, are there training backlogs, shortages of assessors, freezes on offering overtime, lots of poaching by other operators? Just listing recent cancellations doesn’t provide much insight.
 

the sniper

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As always with this sort of thread it would be really helpful if anyone close to the scene could provide any background. For example, is current headcount under establishment, are there training backlogs, shortages of assessors, freezes on offering overtime, lots of poaching by other operators? Just listing recent cancellations doesn’t provide much insight.

Not necessary. There are many forum experts here who specialise in the Guard grade, who I'm sure can provide their detailed analysis of the situation without any involvement or connection to the situation whatsoever.
 

DarloRich

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There were lots of staff shortage cancellations on the marston vale in the evenings at the end of last week and on Saturday
 

bionic

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The railway runs on voluntary overtime. If you don't have enough volunteers you have to cancel trains. If you employ enough staff in the first place you have more chance of covering all the work. This applies across the industry and doesn't take a degree in rocket science to figure out.
 

infobleep

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It's like the start of the LM franchise all over again.
Perhaps they might have to offer free vouchers if it gets that bad again. I got some during that period, though my trains were mostly OK in terms of staff crewing them. Their main issue was not being able to run on time. Not that, that issue was unique to London Midland but I wasn't going to turn down the offer of free vouchers.
 

BucksBones

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Another Sunday, another day of skeleton service from LNR. WMT Twitter people insist that there are a whole legion of newly recruited crew members waiting to start, anyone know how true this is?
 

Carlisle

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Not necessary. There are many forum experts here who specialise in the Guard grade, who I'm sure can provide their detailed analysis of the situation without any involvement or connection to the situation whatsoever.
How would that be possible when nobody’s clarified whether shortages involve drivers, guards, both or another grade altogether like instructors?
 
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HLE

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Another Sunday, another day of skeleton service from LNR. WMT Twitter people insist that there are a whole legion of newly recruited crew members waiting to start, anyone know how true this is?

Legion? A couple of hundred drivers/guards across the company doesn't work out to many for each depot. With the increase in services the effect of the newbies is soon swallowed up.
 

sd0733

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The problem is now that due to morale being through the floor which is pushing sickness up and people are starting to leave and as you only give 4 weeks notice but the replacement takes 6 months to train theres a gap.
Other TOCs are taking qualified train crew, an opportunity I've now taken advantage of to jump out because of increased job security etc and many others are taking advantage too. I know there are a lot at my depot who are thinking of leaving due to the constant late finished due to being stuck all over the place and the ensuing abuse and missing of appointments and child care etc themselves
The dismal performance is seriously taking its toll and causing long term damage and unfortunately once the ballots start things could turn even more ugly.

The drivers side isnt so bad as WM do pay more than some other TOCs so are actually transferring in to WM from other TOCs but the training time is so long that theres still some time before the fruits of all that recruitment start showing.
 
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BucksBones

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Yes, thanks to sd0733 for the insight. Doesn’t bode well does it? Time to buy that motorbike...!!

Also, I must say I had failed to consider the impact of all this on the remaining staff who are running around like the proverbial blue-posteriored flies trying their hardest to run an acceptable service, so thanks for pointing that out too.

Legion? A couple of hundred drivers/guards across the company doesn't work out to many for each depot. With the increase in services the effect of the newbies is soon swallowed up.

“Legion” was just my maybe-ever-so-slightly-sarcastic paraphrase of what LNR’s twitter team have been implying. I take your point entirely.
 
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8J

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It will be even more troublesome when EMR open their new depot at Kettering. I envisage that a fair few drivers and conductors based at Northampton and Bletchley may consider jumping ship for various reasons that I won't go into on this public forum.
 

Mag_seven

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The dismal performance is seriously taking its toll and causing long term damage and unfortunately once the ballots start things could turn even more ugly.

So the "brave new world" promised when Abellio etc took over is starting to fall apart like a cheap suit.
 

sd0733

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So the "brave new world" promised when Abellio etc took over is starting to fall apart like a cheap suit.
Yes it certainly is! It's a real shame as latter day London Midland really started improving and making changes. Since the changeover its pretty much been a shambles from the off and is getting progressively worse!
People I know who really used to enjoy the job now dread going in and as a service its getting to the point you have to travel a train early and even then you cant ways guarantee you'll get there on time
 

gazzaa2

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Yes it certainly is! It's a real shame as latter day London Midland really started improving and making changes. Since the changeover its pretty much been a shambles from the off and is getting progressively worse!
People I know who really used to enjoy the job now dread going in and as a service its getting to the point you have to travel a train early and even then you cant ways guarantee you'll get there on time

Lime Street-New Street is dreadful now. Always a problem further down the line, always delays and cancellations and if it does run it's usually the same 4 cars it used to be before they extended the service, so more overcrowded.
 

setdown

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To be fair, Liverpool - Birmingham was dreadful under London Midland too. Lost count of the times I’d have to wait at Crewe for 60mins+ due to cancellations at weekends, and for a significant amount of time there was no service on Sundays as well.
 

StaffsWCML

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To be fair, Liverpool - Birmingham was dreadful under London Midland too. Lost count of the times I’d have to wait at Crewe for 60mins+ due to cancellations at weekends, and for a significant amount of time there was no service on Sundays as well.

It wasn't as bad at the end of the franchise. Abellio - not surprisingly are taking things backwards.
 
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