First Manchester fined for poor performance

[pemma]

The MEN reports that First Manchester has been fined £285,000 following on from their recent grilling by the Traffic Commissioner over late running services. Beverley Bell (the first female Traffic Commissioner) is reported as saying that she wants to send out a message: “that, without imposing a penalty, First Manchester would not have focused its mind enough to meet the legislation and I still feel it’s being complacent.”

http://manchestertransport.wordpress.com/2012/03/13/firstbus-aims-to-recover-following-285k-fine/

 

[185]

Already been reported, but the more times it appears the better

From the tribunal investigation at Golborne (or, the headmaster's office):

Beverley Bell "So why is performance on the (X) so bad?"
Kenny Poole "Oh, we've not got round to that one yet"
Beverley Bell "..........huh........ WHAT!?"

Firstgroup directors behaving like a bunch of badly behaved schoolkids. Again.

 

[radamfi]

But it does show that the worst possible sanction against a poor performing major operator is a modest fine. Small companies like Speedwell and UK North can be removed, but major operators can't be touched. That is a major flaw with deregulation.

 

[pemma]

Small companies like Speedwell and UK North can be removed, but major operators can't be touched.

That's a bit different. UK North were investigated after an accident involving one of their buses killed someone. They were found to be breaking the law by having Polish drivers who worked longer shifts than the law permitted and the Polish drivers could not deal with a basic ticket request in English properly. 28 buses were selected for inspection and 16 of those failed safety checks.

They were also concerns about the number of buses operating on the 192 route, when UK North were one of the operators running that route.

 

[VTPreston_Tez]

Major operators can be touched but it would result in carnage without appropriate replacement (Bus replacement train anyone?)

 

[Ivo]

Looking again at the MEN article, it is interesting to note that they have covered up the bus's registration - but not its fleet number. Whoops. Let me see now... MX09 HUP. That was so hard (!)

I hope First learn from this, and not just locally either. The entire organisation should take heed and improve. And when you see things like this (I know I've already linked to it elsewhere), it shows just how alarming this problem is. Their complacency seemingly knows no bounds, and Ms Bell obviously agrees with this statement. I highly doubt that anyone outside of First Manchester, including Aberdeen, will actually care though :roll:

I note that "under transport laws, a transport commissioner can impose fines of up to £350 per vehicle on firms that fail to meet the 95 per cent punctuality target" - by this reckoning, FM could have been hit even harder. I make that a fine of roughly £275 per vehicle, based on my data indicating a total fleet size of roughly 1,025 vehicles (assuming my data is accurate of course).

 

[bb21]

Looking again at the MEN article, it is interesting to note that they have covered up the bus's registration - but not its fleet number. Whoops. Let me see now... MX09 HUP. That was so hard (!)

That is one of the reasons why sometimes buses get renumbered.