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Who maintains and updates National Rail Enquiries?

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infobleep

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Who maintains and updates National Rail Enquiries?

Does each train operating company have someone do updates or do they pass on information to NRE who do the updates? What about Network Rail.

Back in around February this year, the road Guildford station is on, Station Approach, was renamed Station View.

National Rail Enquiries are still showing the address as Station Approach

I can ask them to update it but if I wasn't to tweet them, who would usually do such an update?

The road name change is probably due to flat developments in the area, which displayed a marketing name of Station View.
 
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JN114

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For that kind of thing, they employ their own staff
 

HSP 2

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What about the mess that station maps have become? With the old good ones, the half way house ones (too small to read the names of shops etc.) and the dreadful new computer graphic ones that seem to have no information on them.
 

IanXC

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National Rail Enquiries is maintained by a team who work for DB Cargo (of all people) they monitor messages sent out by TOCs about their disruption and create the 'whole railway' versions you see on NRE. For information such as that about stations the TOCs supply this to the NRE team to update the website.
 

Killingworth

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Good luck getting the entry changed quickly. I sent feedback about 3 years ago and nothing changed. Guildford being a big station may get more attention.

The details for my station are at best misleading, out of date, and include;

No address is given at all!
Ramp for train access availability, yes - but not on the station, it's on a train
Step free access - yes from car park to train, but it's a monster step up and across into the train even for the able bodied
"Wheelchair users may require assistance using car park equipment at this station" - what equipment?
Says there is an induction loop - I've never seen it.
Says no drop off point - there are 3 spaces
There are no accessible ticket machines at this station - there is one.
Says Smartcards issued - from an unmanned station?
CCTV yes - In the car park yes, but installation on the platform is years behind schedule.
Pay phones type, Cards and Coins - there hasn't been a payphone for over 6 years
Pictures linked to the map are probably 10 years old and the information with them is totally out of date, although it does say there are no boarding ramps, see above. There is a display board and announcements are made despite it saying the opposite.
 

D6975

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NRE is a mess. There's lots of info that is wrong and lots missing. Rover ticket info is particularly bad, with several rovers not having any prices or validity area info.
 

tankmc

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The National Rail Enquiries website is the worst. It's clunky and hard to use. Most of the information is confusing or hard to find.

The phone line is even worse. You get put through to someone in an overseas call centre who has no clue or concept about the UK rail network or geography.
 

Horizon22

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I've done two surveys about NRE online in the past couple of years to which I gave pitiful scores. I must be overly hopeful that these would actually result in meaningful updates to the website... From a UI perspective it feels like the mid 00s/early 10s.
 

Atishyou

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There's a very small team of people based in Doncaster at the National Rail Communication Centre, responsible for the real-time information for disruptions, engineering and social media.

Everything else, such as station info and fares etc is now updated (or should be) by the retail teams of the relevant TOCs. The NRCC don't do much retail/station bits.

The team at Doncaster do have the facility as 'super admins' of the site, to update info such as this, but would need to check that it had indeed changed names etc.

The responsibility for the UI/design of the site isn't in their hands, that's the Rail Delivery Group.
 

CBlue

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The website isn't great but functional. The app, however, is something designed for a phone from a decade ago! Stretched graphics on a modern screen and half the buttons don't seem to line up...it's a mess. :frown:
 

ta-toget

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To be honest, I'm slightly surprised they keep the telephone line (even the automated one). Are they required to keep it?
 

Flange Squeal

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The app, however, is something designed for a phone from a decade ago! Stretched graphics on a modern screen and half the buttons don't seem to line up...it's a mess. :frown:
Can only speak for iOS, but when changing the date/time it comes up with what looks like should be scrolling up/down the days/months, but doesn't do anything. Was a while before I worked out you had to click on each input, change the digits, then click somewhere around them to close, as there is no 'Done' button after setting your desired date and time.
 

SargeNpton

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To be honest, I'm slightly surprised they keep the telephone line (even the automated one). Are they required to keep it?
You might be surprised by the proportion of the population that has no internet access, or which has a phobia about using it.
 

Steddenm

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You might be surprised by the proportion of the population that has no internet access, or which has a phobia about using it.

...or who find it frustrating trying to use the website or app with the amount of adverts that try and load or the dropdown doesn't work for station names...
 

thedbdiboy

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To be honest, I'm slightly surprised they keep the telephone line (even the automated one). Are they required to keep it?
The telephone enquiry part is a regulatory requirement. NRE is a 'scheme' managed by the TOCs, and in terms of the site and functionality it has drifted quite a bit for the past few years even before Williams; however given the announcement about GBR and national rail retailing I suspect that there will be big changes coming in terms of working out what NRE should be doing and the investment required to achieve it.
 

ta-toget

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You might be surprised by the proportion of the population that has no internet access, or which has a phobia about using it.
I looked it up, according to the ONS
In January to February 2020, 96% of households in Great Britain had internet access
This doesn't really surprise me. Even 80% households with at least one member over 65 were connected to the internet.
However, I can't imagine that the automated Train Tracker is much used by this segment of the population, though perhaps they are more inclined to use the line to speak to a human.
 

GoneSouth

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The website isn't great but functional. The app, however, is something designed for a phone from a decade ago! Stretched graphics on a modern screen and half the buttons don't seem to line up...it's a mess. :frown:
The app is dreadful. I gave up and used several others for info on live journey updates. One of them helpfully has the number of coaches so you can aim for the train which looks like it will be least busy! It does say that the info is obtained through the National Rail Enquiries API so if others can make the effort to display that information, why the hell can’t they be bothered to update their own app.


The other issue I had with it was using IOS dark mode meant you couldn’t even read much of the text on the app.

Just awful!
 

D6975

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For many things, it would unfortunately appear that no-one does.
:)
I have to disagree, someone somewhere is actively removing bits and bobs, leaving gaps, or worse replacing it with incorrect info in places (or worse maps).
 

TravelDream

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Just to add my two-penneth...

Some of the newer maps are totally abysmal. You can't make out what is where and what exactly things are.

The stations with older maps (like most of TFW) are much clearer even if they are a little out of date/ wrong. I much prefer having pictures as well so you can think exactly where you are going in a station.

Maybe it's just me though.
 

PHILIPE

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A case yesterday but as on Twitter is wiped where somebody asked a question and was told to speak with station staff on Platform 1. The problem - an unstaffed station.
 

GoneSouth

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A case yesterday but as on Twitter is wiped where somebody asked a question and was told to speak with station staff on Platform 1. The problem - an unstaffed station.
How is rubbish like this funded? Do the train operators contribute, and if so have they just resigned themselves to handing over a lump of cash for something they can’t control? Or is the truth of the matter that the whole system is so fragmented that nobody actually gives a toss that it’s supposed to be a National network?

I’d like the job of transport minister please.
 

Davester50

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I emailed NRE about the details for my local station several years ago and received a reply, so they did get it.
Station details have never been updated...
 

infobleep

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I emailed NRE about the details for my local station several years ago and received a reply, so they did get it.
Station details have never been updated...
Well the Guildford address hasn't been updated as of yet

Maybe there is not enough staff to do it or someone more senior doesn't see it as a priority. Never underestimate more senior managers not appreciating why something needs to be updated. That doesn't apply to all people working in senior management positions of course but it applies to some. I mean more widely. I don't know the internal circumstances here.

I only contacted them on 16 June and if they are overstretched I can accept why it hasn't been done. I am assuming the message got passed on as they said they would do.
 

SargeNpton

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Who maintains and updates National Rail Enquiries?

Does each train operating company have someone do updates or do they pass on information to NRE who do the updates? What about Network Rail.

Back in around February this year, the road Guildford station is on, Station Approach, was renamed Station View.

National Rail Enquiries are still showing the address as Station Approach

I can ask them to update it but if I wasn't to tweet them, who would usually do such an update?

The road name change is probably due to flat developments in the area, which displayed a marketing name of Station View.
The Royal Mail postcode/address finder still shows Station Approach - so it that is still the official postal address then the NRE entry is correct.
 

philthetube

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I looked it up, according to the ONS

This doesn't really surprise me. Even 80% households with at least one member over 65 were connected to the internet.
However, I can't imagine that the automated Train Tracker is much used by this segment of the population, though perhaps they are more inclined to use the line to speak to a human.
Just because 80% of households with a member over 65 have access does not mean that 80% of the over 65 age group use or understand the internet, it is only 5 years since I asked a coachload of over 75's how many had a smart phone, and there were only 3 on the coach,
 

TravelDream

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Just because 80% of households with a member over 65 have access does not mean that 80% of the over 65 age group use or understand the internet, it is only 5 years since I asked a coachload of over 75's how many had a smart phone, and there were only 3 on the coach,

My grandmother owns a smartphone (well, it's not that smart, but...) and she never does anything other than call on it (not even text) and she doesn't like taking it outside of the house. I can't imagine she's the only one.
 
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