All Line Rover
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- 17 Feb 2011
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According to the 'Contact Us' page of Virgin Trains West Coast's Passengers' Charter, the VTWC Customer Relations team can be contacted by telephone on 03331 031 031. "Telephones are staffed between 08:30 and 18.00 Mondays to Fridays and between 09:00 and 16:00 on Saturdays."
However, when calling 03331 031 031 and pressing option '6' to speak to a member of the Customer Relations team, an automated message is played, explaining that the Customer Relations team is not accepting inbound calls and passengers should instead use the 'LiveChat' feature on the VTWC website.
The VTWC website has long had a 'LiveChat' feature of sorts (this one), although this only deals with enquiries regarding tickets purchased through the VTWC website's booking engine. It is a useful feature when enquiring about the status of refunds for returned tickets (for example), but as the service is run by trainline contractors (i.e. from India), it is useless for more complex enquiries.
The 'LiveChat' recommended when calling 03331 031 031 (which can be found here) is different. The level of knowledge, and the quality of the grammar and spelling, makes it clear that this separate 'LiveChat' service is being administered by the UK-based Customer Relations team.
As long as this separate 'LiveChat' service continues to be administered by the UK-based Customer Relations team, there is nothing wrong with it. The quality of the correspondence is high, there is a written record of all correspondence, and one's position in the queue is displayed. The only improvement I can think of would be for a 'ping' sound to play when one is eventually connected to an advisor, to allow one to be occupied with some other activity while waiting to be connected with an advisor.
Three questions I have are:
1. How long has the 'LiveChat' service administered by VTWC's UK-based Customer Relations team been running?
2. Should VTWC's Passengers' Charter be revised to reflect the fact that 'LiveChat' is now the main method of communicating with the Customer Relations team, with inbound telephone calls no longer being accepted?
3. Have any other train operators adopted the approach taken by VTWC; particularly, other Stagecoach train operators?
However, when calling 03331 031 031 and pressing option '6' to speak to a member of the Customer Relations team, an automated message is played, explaining that the Customer Relations team is not accepting inbound calls and passengers should instead use the 'LiveChat' feature on the VTWC website.
The VTWC website has long had a 'LiveChat' feature of sorts (this one), although this only deals with enquiries regarding tickets purchased through the VTWC website's booking engine. It is a useful feature when enquiring about the status of refunds for returned tickets (for example), but as the service is run by trainline contractors (i.e. from India), it is useless for more complex enquiries.
The 'LiveChat' recommended when calling 03331 031 031 (which can be found here) is different. The level of knowledge, and the quality of the grammar and spelling, makes it clear that this separate 'LiveChat' service is being administered by the UK-based Customer Relations team.
As long as this separate 'LiveChat' service continues to be administered by the UK-based Customer Relations team, there is nothing wrong with it. The quality of the correspondence is high, there is a written record of all correspondence, and one's position in the queue is displayed. The only improvement I can think of would be for a 'ping' sound to play when one is eventually connected to an advisor, to allow one to be occupied with some other activity while waiting to be connected with an advisor.
Three questions I have are:
1. How long has the 'LiveChat' service administered by VTWC's UK-based Customer Relations team been running?
2. Should VTWC's Passengers' Charter be revised to reflect the fact that 'LiveChat' is now the main method of communicating with the Customer Relations team, with inbound telephone calls no longer being accepted?
3. Have any other train operators adopted the approach taken by VTWC; particularly, other Stagecoach train operators?
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