Disabled Woman Stranded Overnight At Lime St

[AntoniC]

Disabled Woman Stranded Overnight At Lime St

A disabled woman was forced to book into a hotel room overnight after she failed to book assistance to travel before turning up at Lime St to get a train home and a promised taxi home to Crewe was then cancelled.


Holly, who uses an electric wheelchair, says the friends missed the last train home after station staff forgot to tell the train's driver a passenger requiring assistance would be boarding the train.

Source Liverpool Echo 12/07/21.

My thoughts on this are that she is being discriminated against because she is disabled and has to book assistance in advance something an able bodied passenger doesn`t.
I agree that she should have got to the station earlier and booked the assistance.
It doesn`t portray the Railway in a good light when they promise a taxi home and then say no and her mum then has to pay for her to stay overnight in hotel.
What do other people think ?

 

[Darandio]

Link quote (saves anyone having to visit that ad infested jumble of a website site)

A disabled woman says she was left stranded in Liverpool overnight after rail staff "forgot" about her.

Holly Webster, from Crewe, visited the city for the first time with friends on Saturday.

She says they booked an open return, with the plan being to return home from Lime Street station that evening.

Holly, who uses an electric wheelchair, says the friends missed the last train home after station staff forgot to tell the train's driver a passenger requiring assistance would be boarding the train.

She said: "We got to the station and asked staff if someone could help me onto the train. They said 'of course' and they told us to go and wait on the platform.

"So we waited, the train came, and we literally watched the doors close. Nobody came."

Holly says when the station staff where asked what happened, they told her they "forgot to radio the train driver".

With the next train to Crewe not due until 8.18am on Sunday, Holly did not know how she and her friends were supposed to get home.

She continued: "Station staff said they would look into getting us a taxi, so we were stood around waiting for ages.

"Then finally someone came over and said we weren't getting a taxi. That was it, we were just stuck in Liverpool at gone 10 o'clock on a Saturday night.

"There was no concern for our safety or anything, we were just basically told to leave."

Luckily, Holly's mum managed to book a room for the women at a Premier Inn in the city centre.

She added: "If my mum hadn't done that, we'd have been sleeping in the station.

"We don't really know our way around Liverpool, but thankfully two street cleaners came and helped us.

"They were great, they walked us right to the hotel and stayed outside with me while my friend went in to check if it was the right hotel. They said they'd have tried every hotel in Liverpool until we found the right one.

"It might sound daft but they really cheered us up - at a time we needed it."

A Network Rail spokesman said: “We understand that being stranded is very distressing and we apologise we were unable to get Miss Webster the assistance she needed to board her last train home on Saturday night.

“We’d always advise passengers to prebook Assisted Travel by calling 0800 0223720.

 

[Tazi Hupefi]

Disabled Woman Stranded Overnight At Lime St

A disabled woman was forced to book into a hotel room overnight after she failed to book assistance to travel before turning up at Lime St to get a train home and a promised taxi home to Crewe was then cancelled.

Source Liverpool Echo 12/07/21.

My thoughts on this are that she is being discriminated against because she is disabled and has to book assistance in advance something an able bodied passenger doesn`t.
I agree that she should have got to the station earlier and booked the assistance.
It doesn`t portray the Railway in a good light when they promise a taxi home and then say no and her mum then has to pay for her to stay overnight in hotel.
What do other people think ?

It’s not unlawful per se to require prebooking- in fact this can be positive in some circumstances, although the operator should (must) still take all reasonable steps to assist even without prebooking.

The possible discrimination argument appears less strong than the one you can make relating to a very poor customer experience, and the probable breach of contract around failing to arrange alternative transport or accommodation to a holder of a valid ticket, especially one who is potentially (but not automatically) vulnerable.

However, a local news story is not a reliable view of what actually happened in my view. Certainly some question marks around the events.

 

[deltic]

We never hear both sides of the story with these events but taken at face value she seems to have been badly let down if staff did say they would assist in boarding and then didnt provide assistance. Its not clear on Network Rail's site that you have to book assistance in advance and West Midland Railways do not require pre-booking of assistance so Network Rail's response may be misleading

 

[the sniper]

Something seems a bit off.

Holly says when the station staff where asked what happened, they told her they "forgot to radio the train driver"

It has nothing to do with the Driver of course, but I'd be surprised if they gave that as an excuse.

The service would have a Guard and Lime Street isn't self despatch, so there'd have been a member of platform staff there too, which aren't mentioned as she presumably didn't see them, unfortunately.

If the Care Bears forgot her or weren't informed by whoever she spoke to, which you could imagine could be the case, I'm surprised they wouldn't have just sorted out a taxi. It'd be no skin off their nose.

 

[Tazi Hupefi]

Other thing which has just occurred to me is that a taxi from Liverpool to Crewe, at least one that is prebooked like an Uber or private hire, can’t be all that much more in cost than a last minute city centre hotel room, and without the hassle of an overnight stay and next day rail journey.

I’d imagine a major city like Liverpool usually has plenty of accessible cars too.

 

[mrcheek]

I wonder if this will turn out to be another Guide Bridge situation......

 

[Sleepy]

Network Rail v TOC who's paying for the taxi discussion? Stalemate so passenger fobbed off....

 

[the sniper]

Network Rail v TOC who's paying for the taxi discussion? Stalemate so passenger fobbed off....

Who provides the passenger assists routinely at Lime Street, NR or Northern, I can't remember? Which ever it is, they'd be paying.

 

[LowLevel]

Got to be more to it than the article says. The guard and dispatch staff wouldn't just ignore a wheelchair user trying to get their attention on the platform. It is nothing at all to do with "the driver" and you can't radio them so why would anyone say that?

Some of the passenger assistance staff at Lime St are frankly less than professional and effective (a particular individual went through a spell of reporting guards for refusing to deploy wheelchair ramps themselves rather than the assistance bod doing it which is the service TOCs pay for, saying the guards had "verbally abused them", until they were caught out with multiple witnesses after the very similar reports were noted). But I can't imagine that the facts as reported are correct.

 

[Vespa]

Do rail companies not have a duty of care in such circumstances as if an able bodied person needed a taxi to get to his destination at TOC expense in the event of a disruption ?

 

[GLC]

Would an incident such as this be investigated by either NR or the TOC? I would have expected the NR PR response to say they were investigating this issue (well at least beaded on the response that was published)

 

[Ianno87]

Do rail companies not have a duty of care in such circumstances as if an able bodied person needed a taxi to get to his destination at TOC expense in the event of a disruption ?

Yes. Although this poor lady's situation was seemingly pure railway cock-up, not as a result of disruption (which is perhaps why she fell "under the radar" as it were)

 

[Dai Corner]

Out of interest, what's. the platform-train interface like for the platform and class of train involved? Good enough for the lady to board with the help of her friends or poor enough to require a member of staff to deploy a ramp?

 

[Vespa]

Yes. Although this poor lady's situation was seemingly pure railway cock-up, not as a result of disruption (which is perhaps why she fell "under the radar" as it were)

There seems to be a need for a centralised disability coordinator to put everything together and get everybody talking to each other so nothing is dropped in between handovers.

Out of interest, what's. the platform-train interface like for the platform and class of train involved? Good enough for the lady to board with the help of her friends or poor enough to require a member of staff to deploy a ramp?

Not good, there is big step from train to platform for most classes, I've never seen any level boarding.

 

[Spartacus]

Out of interest, what's. the platform-train interface like for the platform and class of train involved? Good enough for the lady to board with the help of her friends or poor enough to require a member of staff to deploy a ramp?

I think the last service is a 350 which is pretty decent. Thing is it looks like she was in an electric wheelchair which is a totally different kettle of fish when it comes to manual boarding, usually rather heavy even on their own, and usually without large rear wheels which can often be rolled back up the step without much difficulty, nicely avoiding the gap too.

 

[the sniper]

Would an incident such as this be investigated by either NR or the TOC? I would have expected the NR PR response to say they were investigating this issue (well at least beaded on the response that was published)

Given it's made the media, I'd imagine so. As for the NR response, if the actual circumstances had already been established and they didn't believe it was the railway's fault, I highly doubt they'd publicly callout the passenger here as being in the wrong regardless.

If it were clear cut, I can't imagine why a taxi wouldn't have been arranged. The NR response only adds to that suspicion.

 

[185143]

Other thing which has just occurred to me is that a taxi from Liverpool to Crewe, at least one that is prebooked like an Uber or private hire, can’t be all that much more in cost than a last minute city centre hotel room, and without the hassle of an overnight stay and next day rail journey.

I’d imagine a major city like Liverpool usually has plenty of accessible cars too.

You'd be surprised. I've seen some horrific fares quoted by Uber late at night recently. Manchester-Blackpool at 00:15 a few Friday nights ago? £188.
Manchester-Huddersfield at a similar time the next night? £209. Blackpool by comparison was in the region of £360.

Meanwhile I've had Travelodge rooms in both Edinburgh and Glasgow on the day recently and both were less than £30.

So based on that, I can well believe why a hotel was chosen! That said, I fully agree with the above comments that something just doesn't add up over this.

 

[Metal_gee_man]

Just check out the videos from Doug Paulley on YouTube Doug Paulleys YT Channel his railway/bus and coach travel challenges with an electric wheelchair. He can be a little antagonistic but his, the laws and everyone's expectations of bookingless assistance shouldn't be ignored.

 

[LowLevel]

Got to be more to it than the article says. The guard and dispatch staff wouldn't just ignore a wheelchair user trying to get their attention on the platform. It is nothing at all to do with "the driver" and you can't radio them so why would anyone say that?

Some of the passenger assistance staff at Lime St are frankly less than professional and effective (a particular individual went through a spell of reporting guards for refusing to deploy wheelchair ramps themselves rather than the assistance bod doing it which is the service TOCs pay for, saying the guards had "verbally abused them", until they were caught out with multiple witnesses after the very similar reports were noted). But I can't imagine that the facts as reported are correct.

Having had a think the only thing I can assume is that with staffing being reduced later in the evening the passengers were unfortunate enough to initially come across someone who wasn't either passenger assistance or operationally involved, NR provide passenger assistance but Northern provide train dispatch to WMR at Lime St, possibly security staff or similar, and as a result they've fallen through the cracks with the hand off from their initial meeting with a staff member failing.

Depending on what is going on the Northern dispatchers have quite a lot of running around to do there at times particularly later in the day when there are fewer of them and trains coming out of service to go on the depot.

I suppose it is possible that they turned up without much time before departure, or were further up the platform because of the curve and didn't note the wheelchair user and given most/all WMR trains are 8 cars at the moment the guard is likely to have been in the middle cab so again, might not have seen someone further towards the platform entrance waiting.

 

[the sniper]

I suppose it is possible that they turned up without much time before departure, or were further up the platform because of the curve and didn't note the wheelchair user and given most/all WMR trains are 8 cars at the moment the guard is likely to have been in the middle cab so again, might not have seen someone further towards the platform entrance waiting.

Very valid point, that'd make sense.

 

[Mugby]

I'm not convinced by this. By the person's own admission, she was there when the train came, saw the doors close and watched it depart.

Trains don't just come and go at Lime Street, they terminate and carry out all the usual procedures, changing ends etc. There would have been a reasonable amount of turnaround time involved.
The driver not being told thing is a complete red herring, It sounds to me like the party arrived late and saw the train departing, a taxi would have been quite reasonably refused if the person simply turned up too late to catch the train.
I can't help feeling that the story has been embellished somewhat to garner sympathy which might not otherwise have been forthcoming,

 

[24Grange]

Just a minor point, and unconnected really. But not all Taxi's can take a wheelchair ( they are few and far between) and the ones that can are pretty busy and booked up most of the time.

Journalism 101 - simplify then exaggerate.

 

[Megafuss]

Given the opportunity to tell the "other side" of the story, Network Rail apologised for not being able to arrange assistance. They didn't blame the customer given the opportunity to do so. So to me it's a simple railway cock-up.

 

[notlob.divad]

I'm not convinced by this. By the person's own admission, she was there when the train came, saw the doors close and watched it depart.

Trains don't just come and go at Lime Street, they terminate and carry out all the usual procedures, changing ends etc. There would have been a reasonable amount of turnaround time involved.

That particular train has a scheduled 7 minute turn around and arrived 1 minute late. Normally LM have a 20 minute turnaround, so it is certainly one of the snappier ones for a terminus station.

 

[Purple Orange]

Why do some people appear to come to the defence of the rail industry straight away, rather than take the position of believing the passenger and their experience?

 

[Gems]

I tend to take story's like this with a pinch of salt. The trouble with stories is you only get one side of it. I have witnessed myself disabled passengers just ride past in electric wheelchairs and park themselves outside the trains disabled bay. Never think to seek the guard or ask platform staff. It's like an expectation that they must be noticed.
However that is not always the case is it? I myself have almost missed them waiting, lost in a surrounding sea of pushchairs, other people, and platform furniture.

Why do some people appear to come to the defence of the rail industry straight away, rather than take the position of believing the passenger and their experience?

Probably because many posters on here are very familiar with the railway system, passenger behaviour, and reality. And therefore know that what a passengers says, thinks, or believes happened often isn't the case.

 

[tiptoptaff]

Given the opportunity to tell the "other side" of the story, Network Rail apologised for not being able to arrange assistance. They didn't blame the customer given the opportunity to do so. So to me it's a simple railway cock-up.

They, or indeed any TOC, would not come out and publicly blame the passenger. Unfortunately, the public don't care about what actually happened, they care about what they believe happened. And whatever the outcome of an investigation, the majority of the public will believe the story in the press without question.

So it's not better PR to apologise for the incident, its just less bad

 

[Purple Orange]

I tend to take story's like this with a pinch of salt. The trouble with stories is you only get one side of it. I have witnessed myself disabled passengers just ride past in electric wheelchairs and park themselves outside the trains disabled bay. Never think to seek the guard or ask platform staff. It's like an expectation that they must be noticed.
However that is not always the case is it? I myself have almost missed them waiting, lost in a surrounding sea of pushchairs, other people, and platform furniture.


Probably because many posters on here are very familiar with the railway system, passenger behaviour, and reality. And therefore know that what a passengers says, thinks, or believes happened often isn't the case.

I think many posters on here, including many passengers, are familiar with the reality. Your reality will be very different to the next person. To me it comes across as folk sticking their head in the sand. A passenger tells of a bad experience using the railway and then we have people simply not believing they are telling the truth.

 

[tiptoptaff]

Why do some people appear to come to the defence of the rail industry straight away, rather than take the position of believing the passenger and their experience?

Because as Gem has said far more succinctly than I ever could, we observe these people every day and the way they behave and interact with the railway, its staff and its trains. Stories such as this are rarely correct as reported.