Avanti West Coast to cut number of services in December

[dk1]

I imagine that absence through illness is also up.

Is there any particular reason for that?

 

[Bald Rick]

Is there any particular reason for that?

Absence through illness is up everywhere, AIUI. Tis the season.

Certainly is where I am (home and work).

 

[dk1]

Absence through illness is up everywhere, AIUI. Tis the season.

Certainly is where I am (home and work).

Totally the opposite here. Never known such low sickness levels.

 

[778]

Will the service levels be increased in January?

 

[dk1]

Will the service levels be increased in January?

Apparently but who knows? Time will tell.

 

[cslusarc]

I wonder if the rail industry has blackout dates for when you can't take your annual leave/vacation time?

 

[dk1]

I wonder if the rail industry has blackout dates for when you can't take your annual leave/vacation time?

Not at my TOC for drivers apart from Christmas week. The strict holiday roster runs from the first week in January to the middle of December.

For loose days leave the first 4 in my depot to apply are guaranteed to have them granted regardless of whether their turn can be covered or not as per the staffing agreements.

 

[td97]

The cut to Saturday services actually begins in November.
The xx35 from Manchester and xx13 from Euston are removed .
Nuneaton is transferred to the Liverpool service.

 

[AndrewE]

The cut to Saturday services actually begins in November.
The xx35 from Manchester and xx13 from Euston are removed .
Nuneaton is transferred to the Liverpool service.

Every cloud, and all that:
On the up-side Liverpool and Crewe now have a second train an hour to Nuneaton (for Peterboro etc), on the down-side the new train has a 49-minute connection, compared to the current 40 minutes! I wonder whether the extra Liverpool-Euston trains that we are promised will put this right?
Oh! for a sensible planned timetable, compared with the succession of short-term fixes and sub-optimal reactions to problems that we seem to be stuck with.

 

[The Planner]

Every cloud, and all that:
On the up-side Liverpool and Crewe now have a second train an hour to Nuneaton (for Peterboro etc), on the down-side the new train has a 49-minute connection, compared to the current 40 minutes! I wonder whether the extra Liverpool-Euston trains that we are promised will put this right?
Oh! for a sensible planned timetable, compared with the succession of short-term fixes and sub-optimal reactions to problems that we seem to be stuck with.

Except this won't last forever, and can't work when Liverpools go over to 807s as you won't be able to fit a Nuneaton stop in. I will feedback to the people who spent a few years developing it that its not sensible!

 

[sprunt]

Fewer trains to run from London to Manchester

Avanti is to run a reduced service between London to Manchester on Saturdays until the end of the year.

www.bbc.co.uk

Train operator Avanti West Coast will be cancelling nearly 20 services every Saturday between London Euston and Manchester Piccadilly until the end of the year.
It had earlier announced plans to scrap two in five of the trains it runs on the popular route from December 9.
However the BBC understands the reduced timetable will start immediately.
First reported by the Sunday Times newspaper, Avanti blamed a shortage of train crew and industrial disputes.

Ah, more levelling up.

Also from DfT:

"Traincrew shortages, linked to train drivers on average £60,000 salaries refusing to work overtime, highlight the need for modernisation across the wider railway that is being resisted by unions.

Sounds fair enough. If I were on 60k i wouldn't want to work overtime, and if the business I were working for depended on my working overtime to operate I'd probably be looking for another job.

 

[ThePeakNed]

.

 

[Baz2000]

Hi all, im very surprised, to find that Avanti West Coast have cut the number of trains to and from Birmingham to London & also to Manchester, to the run up to the very busy Christmas travel holidays, i thought they had about 100 new train drivers this year!, we dont see aother trains companies do this, but on the good side its only short term till end of the year, but also it drives peaple to use the coach, AWC should make sure have plenty of staff plus a pool of spare train drivers too, whch would help and increase train profits too, but as a side note why doesnt London north western run proper express intercity services Birmingham to London, with a trolly service, and ltd stop to speed up the very long times.

 

[hexagon789]

we dont see aother trains companies do this, but on the good side its only short term till end of the year

But we do, several companies have made alterations equalling cuts in this December timetable, such as TPE and ScotRail on certain routes.

Conversely, others have made some improvements.

 

[dk1]

but as a side note why doesnt London north western run proper express intercity services Birmingham to London, with a trolly service, and ltd stop to speed up the very long times.

It’s not LNWRs bag to run fast services Birmingham to London. They are contracted by the DfT to operate semi-fast services via Northampton.

 

[Baz2000]

thanks but i was going by the trains companies in the Birmingham area , i know those best, as its my area.

It’s not LNWRs bag to run fast services Birmingham to London. They are contracted by the DfT to operate semi-fast services via Northampton.

thanks but i do notice from the timetable they do run fast south of Northampton and have done for quite a few years but i belive that section better now.

 

[Bald Rick]

i thought they had about 100 new train drivers this year!

They have.

 

[Sorcerer]

"Traincrew shortages, linked to train drivers on average £60,000 salaries refusing to work overtime, highlight the need for modernisation across the wider railway that is being resisted by unions.

You can just feel the resentment and itching for class warfare in this statement. The salary is not relevant to the statement whatsoever, and the jab at the unions only demonstrate it further. A more neutral statement would simply be the statement of traincrew shortages causing cancellations highlighting the need for modernisation, but in typical fashion do we see a subtle push for the narrative of greedy selfish train drivers holding the country to ransom for daring to not work overtime. You can't even fully blame Avanti management either because they've been recruiting train drivers all year.

 

[Merle Haggard]

They have.

But, circumstantially, I don't think that the new drivers all have a complete route knowledge for all eventualities
I was on the 08.15 Milton Keynes - Liverpool on the 25th. Owing to a treespasser between Stafford and Crewe the line was blocked. We stood at Colwich for some time (possibly because of a discussion signaller/driver - there seemed to be no conflicting moves) then waited at Stoke to be overtaken by a number of Down trains and eventually set off again after a second Avanti Manchester had called, before going Kidsgrove - Crewe.
My explanation for this might possibly be that the driver was one of the recent trained recruits who, to speed up acceptance, hadn't been trained for Kidsgove - Crewe (and possibly other diversionary routes), and there was a driver swap with the Manchester train's driver (who did).
That's just my guess, but if I'm right it might happen again. Certainly caused some delays.

 

[The Chimaera]

Hi all, im very surprised, to find that Avanti West Coast have cut the number of trains to and from Birmingham to London & also to Manchester, to the run up to the very busy Christmas travel holidays, i thought they had about 100 new train drivers this year!, we dont see aother trains companies do this, but on the good side its only short term till end of the year, but also it drives peaple to use the coach, AWC should make sure have plenty of staff plus a pool of spare train drivers too, whch would help and increase train profits too, but as a side note why doesnt London north western run proper express intercity services Birmingham to London, with a trolly service, and ltd stop to speed up the very long times.

Avanti might have recruited over 100 drivers but the number of drivers leaving or retiring early has been substantial. Around 25% of the driver workforce at my former depot have left in the last 2 years. The attitude of the employer was a great encouragement for most.

 

[dk1]

Avanti might have recruited over 100 drivers but the number of drivers leaving or retiring early has been substantial. Around 25% of the driver workforce at my former depot have left in the last 2 years. The attitude of the employer was a great encouragement for most.

It totally evades me how any employer could or even want to alienate the most important people on their payroll. It’s like a massive internal suicide mission. You’d think historical lessons learnt & all that but no, round we go again.

 

[Deafdoggie]

Avanti might have recruited over 100 drivers but the number of drivers leaving or retiring early has been substantial. Around 25% of the driver workforce at my former depot have left in the last 2 years. The attitude of the employer was a great encouragement for most.

It totally evades me how any employer could or even want to alienate the most important people on their payroll. It’s like a massive internal suicide mission. You’d think historical lessons learnt & all that but no, round we go again.

Genuine question from an outsider, what could Avant do to improve morale? i.e. Things that are directly within their control.

 

[dk1]

Genuine question from an outsider, what could Avant do to improve morale? i.e. Things that are directly within their control.

Genuine question from an outsider, what could Avant do to improve morale? i.e. Things that are directly within their control.

I think that’s best replied from an Avanti employee who can give full details of some of the many issues that have caused such toxic internal relations to develop how they have.

 

[Carlisle]

Genuine question from an outsider, what could Avant do to improve morale? i.e. Things that are directly within their control.

They’re probably trying their best whilst appreciating the honeymoon period where Virgin’s introduction of a trendy brand, new fleet & generous restructuring related pay rises can’t simply be repeated over & over again.

 

[dk1]

They’re probably trying their best whilst appreciating the honeymoon period where Virgin’s introduction of a trendy brand, new fleet & generous restructuring related pay rises can’t simply be repeated over & over again.

Mores the pity.

 

[Triumph]

The cut to Saturday services actually begins in November.
The xx35 from Manchester and xx13 from Euston are removed .
Nuneaton is transferred to the Liverpool service.

I have just had a look back and the full saturday service/diagrams have never acually run since the May TT started.
Every weekend there has been eng work with reduced platforms at Euston and 2 track working, so the Manchaester service has only ever had 2 tph at most.
Also some weekends there were long diversions via the WM and some weekends with trains reversing at BHM, which means there would not be enough stock available to run 3 tph anyway.

 

[317 forever]

At least any Saturday strikes will only deny us 2 trains per hour between Manchester and London, not 3 trains

 

[The Chimaera]

They’re probably trying their best whilst appreciating the honeymoon period where Virgin’s introduction of a trendy brand, new fleet & generous restructuring related pay rises can’t simply be repeated over & over again.

I’m afraid their not trying at all, gone are the days of ‘we’re all in it together lads, let’s make the best of it’ now it’s all a ‘us and them’ blame game.
The downward spiral continues…

 

[jfollows]

It totally evades me how any employer could or even want to alienate the most important people on their payroll. It’s like a massive internal suicide mission. You’d think historical lessons learnt & all that but no, round we go again.

My limited personal experience and observation makes me think that this is common across industries and reflects on the poor standard of management in general, having people placed in management positions because it's necessary for career enhancement and the Peter Principle of promoting people until they reach their point of incompetence.
I say that with no personal experience of the railway industry, but could see parallels with my experience recently. Companies seem to treat employees as expense items, and therefore "bad" rather than assets, and "good". Management is incentivised to reduce expenses, and people get swept up in this nonsense.
Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed my two significant jobs, but I left them both at a time of my choosing because I no longer enjoyed them and felt the balance between what I put in to the jobs versus what I got out of them had changed too much, primarily because of the way the organisations were managed and run. In the second job I was a manager, but my slightly radical agenda probably blocked me from promotion to a significant role in running the organisation, and without that I wasn't in a position to fight the people I knew were doing things wrong.
But many people can't afford to resign from their job, at least it's something which can take significant effort - in my first case I spent a year finding a new job before resigning, for example.
But the way in which the majority of employers treat their most important asset is very bad, not just in the UK, and across industries. I think if managers were properly trained rather than appointed with crossed fingers, things would be better. Avanti appears to conform with my poor expectations from what I have seen and heard.

 

[Archvile]

They have.

The vast majority are currently sat in a talent pool. Very limited movement as of yet due lack of training capacity.