So, after an incident with a few services that haven’t run despite holding advanced tickets, and a similar thing happening my friend and after reading countless similar stories on here and social media I have been wondering just how hard it is to minimise this issue.
This is not just in relation to the strikes, infact it is equally as problematic during the engineering works.
Timetables are generally updated a long time in advance and when there are changes there are updates at certain intervals so that retails can sell the correct tickets.
Now, if these updates can be done frequently enough, say for example once a day or better then what is to stop all retailers uploading a blank timetable for days where there is engineering work or strike action weeks / months in advance?
Nearer the time when they have put a plan in place and have finalised what services are running they can upload AGAIN with the final timetable.
This to me seems to solve several issues.
1. People know that something is up on that day. They might go to a website where it can explain there is engineering work, and this might allow people to replan their day / week well in advance.
2. Advanced tickets won’t be on sale with connections that don’t exist causing chaos at stations when people miss their trains and have to get later services / taxis.
3. People won’t buy open tickets with an itinerary which are always available currently so won’t be disappointed.
4. The people that try to buy a ticket and only find open tickets won’t conplain that prices have gone up from £13 to £106 overnight when advances aren’t available.
5. Customers know where they stand. It might seem less important but actually to many customers this is far more important than punctuality. They don’t mind their journey taking longer if they know about it, they don’t mind being late if they’re kept up to date
6. Less delay repay claims. Northern are rejecting delay repay claims on advances that were sold for strike days when customers have to travel the next day. They’re rejecting refunds on open tickets with an itinerary when a customer decides not to travel as they can’t get home.
Trainline are also rejecting refunds because the service ‘does not exist’
GTR are refusing delay repay claims because there was a bus involved and it was engineering works that caused delays, even when you have an itinerary on an advance single.
All in all it’s rather poor from a number of parties.
So what actually physically stops Northern uploading a BLANK timetable for every Saturday to the 16th Feb and then uploading a revised one again when they’ve finalised a strike timetable?
The same question to other operators with engineering works ?
This is not just in relation to the strikes, infact it is equally as problematic during the engineering works.
Timetables are generally updated a long time in advance and when there are changes there are updates at certain intervals so that retails can sell the correct tickets.
Now, if these updates can be done frequently enough, say for example once a day or better then what is to stop all retailers uploading a blank timetable for days where there is engineering work or strike action weeks / months in advance?
Nearer the time when they have put a plan in place and have finalised what services are running they can upload AGAIN with the final timetable.
This to me seems to solve several issues.
1. People know that something is up on that day. They might go to a website where it can explain there is engineering work, and this might allow people to replan their day / week well in advance.
2. Advanced tickets won’t be on sale with connections that don’t exist causing chaos at stations when people miss their trains and have to get later services / taxis.
3. People won’t buy open tickets with an itinerary which are always available currently so won’t be disappointed.
4. The people that try to buy a ticket and only find open tickets won’t conplain that prices have gone up from £13 to £106 overnight when advances aren’t available.
5. Customers know where they stand. It might seem less important but actually to many customers this is far more important than punctuality. They don’t mind their journey taking longer if they know about it, they don’t mind being late if they’re kept up to date
6. Less delay repay claims. Northern are rejecting delay repay claims on advances that were sold for strike days when customers have to travel the next day. They’re rejecting refunds on open tickets with an itinerary when a customer decides not to travel as they can’t get home.
Trainline are also rejecting refunds because the service ‘does not exist’
GTR are refusing delay repay claims because there was a bus involved and it was engineering works that caused delays, even when you have an itinerary on an advance single.
All in all it’s rather poor from a number of parties.
So what actually physically stops Northern uploading a BLANK timetable for every Saturday to the 16th Feb and then uploading a revised one again when they’ve finalised a strike timetable?
The same question to other operators with engineering works ?