Virgin Trains Camping and Leisure Supplies

[boxy321]

I missed my usual train this morning so had a quarter of an hour to sit in the first class lounge at Coventry station. I'm no stranger to seeing the suits fill their bags with loot to take home for the kids and family, but today a guy even had a cardboard box presumably to stock up with canned drinks for a meeting.

I've heard that VT are considering reducing what's in the lounges due to this p!ss taking as what I saw this morning was unreal. Signs recently went up asking people to take only what they can eat there and then: I would question why there is shortbread and muffins available at 7:30 in the morning anyway.

The place looks like the aftermath of a childrens' birthday party after the 07:31 leaves for Euston (not having a go at them particularly). The staff are more than aware of this too.

 

[AlterEgo]

Well, it is Coventry.

You see this everywhere, even in First/Business Class lounges on major airlines where people might have paid thousands for a ticket. I've no problem with sneaking a Coke, but cardboard boxes or filling bags is beyond the pale.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Well, it is Coventry.

You see this everywhere, even in First/Business Class lounges on major airlines where people might have paid thousands for a ticket. I've no problem with sneaking a Coke, but cardboard boxes or filling bags is beyond the pale.

Scope to charge a few of the more ridiculous ones with theft pour encourager les autres? Such places make it clear that things are only there for consumption on the premises on signage, so surely taking anything outside the terms under which it is offered is clear theft.

 

[AlterEgo]

Scope to charge a few of the more ridiculous ones with theft pour encourager les autres? Such places make it clear that things are only there for consumption on the premises on signage, so surely taking anything outside the terms under which it is offered is clear theft.

Sadly Virgin are very prosecution-averse and will do anything to avoid bad publicity, in my experience.

 

[boxy321]

I actually avoid these lounges now, such is the vagrancy and foodbank mentality across the land. I'd rather have an extra half pint in one of the hostelries around New St for example (does not include All Bar One!).

Euston's lounge resembled a bomb shelter during some disruption there last year.

 

[duncanp]

You get the same in hotels that have an all you can eat breakfast buffet.

I have seen tight fisted families making up sandwiches for a picnic lunch, using the bread, ham, hard boiled eggs etc.

 

[HowardGWR]

Deary me. Perhaps this could be solved by first class ('classy'?) ticket holders be given vouchers that could be exchanged for 'one consumption', (a drink and a snack)? Are the lounge catering points manned? I've never travelled first class in the privatised era, so I've no idea.

 

[HowardGWR]

You get the same in hotels that have an all you can eat breakfast buffet.

I have seen tight fisted families making up sandwiches for a picnic lunch, using the bread, ham, hard boiled eggs etc.

We've allowed ourselves occasionally to take an apple or banana with us, after breakfast in such circumstances. I don't think that is 'coming it' and we always do that very openly. The fruit bowls always seem to be positioned near the entrance for that purpose. I always think that if one behaves like you describe, it is just too self-demeaning, to be contemplated.

 

[duncanp]

There is nothing wrong in taking the odd apple or banana, but making up a whole round of sandwiches, not to mention filling a flask with coffee, is definitely taking the p!ss.

 

[Bletchleyite]

There is nothing wrong in taking the odd apple or banana, but making up a whole round of sandwiches, not to mention filling a flask with coffee, is definitely taking the p!ss.

Though one thing I have wondered, given that people evidently want to do this and might not actually mind paying the cost of the "materials" plus a small fee, is why they don't actually offer it as a service at an additional fee. Mind you I half think I have seen a hotel offer it.

 

[AlterEgo]

Though one thing I have wondered, given that people evidently want to do this and might not actually mind paying the cost of the "materials" plus a small fee, is why they don't actually offer it as a service at an additional fee. Mind you I half think I have seen a hotel offer it.

I have been to hotels which offer a packed lunch service - fairly common in the countryside where people go for walks.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I have been to hotels which offer a packed lunch service - fairly common in the countryside where people go for walks.

Yeah, just occurred to me that the others could offer it (DIY from the breakfast buffet) too, and it'd be at zero staff cost and probably reduce the pilferage.

They could sort-of enforce it by providing marked lunch bags for each one paid for.

 

[NickBucks]

There is nothing wrong in taking the odd apple or banana, but making up a whole round of sandwiches, not to mention filling a flask with coffee, is definitely taking the p!ss.

I did not realise Virgin's coffee was that bad!

 

[GW43125]

I did not realise Virgin's coffee was that bad!

The tea on VTWC really isn't good.

 

[rosschap]

I have seen a similar thing at the VTWC lounge at Euston. I am sort of guilty myself though, when I am waiting for the Sleeper I put a few bottles of water in my bag for the train and to brush my teeth the next morning, since the tap in the cabin isn't drinking water and they only provide you with one little bottle on board.

 

[Puffing Devil]

Yeah, just occurred to me that the others could offer it (DIY from the breakfast buffet) too, and it'd be at zero staff cost and probably reduce the pilferage.

They could sort-of enforce it by providing marked lunch bags for each one paid for.

What a great idea!

 

[daikilo]

Scope to charge a few of the more ridiculous ones with theft pour encourager les autres? Such places make it clear that things are only there for consumption on the premises on signage, so surely taking anything outside the terms under which it is offered is clear theft.

Yes, it would be theft, and could even lead to issues to be discussed with the employer if a company had bought the ticket.

 

[Bletchleyite]

What a great idea!

It's sometimes worth checking out peoples' rationale for committing low-level crime when trying to prevent it. Often it isn't because they want something for free, it's because the market wasn't offering what they wanted. Online music piracy was a great example - lots of people downloaded illegally because they couldn't download legally.

So, if people want to make sandwiches from the breakfast buffet let them, for a small (but still profitable, as the only cost is the marginal one of the extra bread, cheese, ham etc[1]) fee.

[1] People who are making sandwiches from a breakfast buffet are very unlikely to be the same people who would otherwise be purchasing lunch in the hotel restaurant.

 

[30907]

Couple of (contradictory) observations from mainland Europe:

1. Austrian Railways lounge specifically restricts consumption to "an average person's amount" or some such phrase. Presume this gives them leverage (not that there's much to eat these days).

2. It seems to be acceptable or at least tolerated in Germany to make up a lunch packet from the standard "extensive varied buffet" - not talking chain hotels BTW, less experience of them!

 

[Blindtraveler]

I disagree with the idea of reducing the lounge offer as thats simply the minority spoiling it for the majority.

I must say though that I have read reports on this very forum of people being greedy, thankfully not any poster so far on this thread.

I myself will try a bit of everything thats going but in modderation and dont see that taking a water or juice for your onward trip, particularly if said trip is the plus connections leg of a journey that started in First and you have been using the lounge at your interchange point.

 

[tspaul26]

Yes, it would be theft...

I would not necessarily be so sure of that.

From R. v Ghosh [1982] 1 QB 1053:

In determining whether the prosecution has proved that the defendant was acting dishonestly, a jury must first of all decide whether according to the ordinary standards of reasonable and honest people what was done was dishonest. If it was not dishonest by those standards, that is the end of the matter and the prosecution fails.

If it was dishonest by those standards, then the jury must consider whether the defendant himself must have realised that what he was doing was by those standards dishonest. In most cases, where the actions are obviously dishonest by ordinary standards, there will be no doubt about it. It will be obvious that the defendant himself knew that he was acting dishonestly. It is dishonest for a defendant to act in a way which he knows ordinary people consider to be dishonest, even if he asserts or genuinely believes that he is morally justified in acting as he did.