Heathrow Express Strike - 23/24th September

[Cross City]

Heathrow Express 48-hour strike action begins on Monday

Heathrow Express staff will take 48 hours of strike action, from Monday, in response to a pay offer that was overwhelmingly rejected by members.

www.rmt.org.uk

RMT Press Office:

Heathrow Express staff will take 48 hours of strike action, from Monday, in response to a pay offer that was overwhelmingly rejected by members.

Despite mulitple attempts to resolve the dispute, members will take the action next week.

RMT General Secretary Mick Lynch said: "Our members at Heathrow Express have made their position clear with a strong mandate for action. They are determined to secure fair pay and better working conditions.

"Heathrow Express management must now recognise the serious concerns of the workforce and return to the table with a meaningful offer."

The union remains open to further negotiations, calling on Heathrow Express management to improve their offer and avoid ongoing disruption.

I'd not heard anything about this, and there is nothing on the HX website. Does anybody have any idea about service levels? Thanks

 

[Tazi Hupefi]

No reason the trains can't run. The drivers are from GWR and run DOO.

Unless there's some sort of issue that requires a minimum number of staff at the Heathrow stations for fire safety, but that would also affect Elizabeth line. Presumably you could use managers instead and forgo revenue protection.

 

[matt_world2004]

No reason the trains can't run. The drivers are from GWR and run DOO.

Unless there's some sort of issue that requires a minimum number of staff at the Heathrow stations for fire safety, but that would also affect Elizabeth line. Presumably you could use managers instead and forgo revenue

The stations are underground so would be required to be staffed. It is also not clear from the press release if this is station staff or drivers from the Heathrow express business unit within GwR (who AFAIK are under different terms and conditions to GwR staff)

If its the station staff it's possible that terminal 5 piccadilly line would have to close too as that's staffed by Heathrow express too

 

[thelongestroad]

The stations are underground so would be required to be staffed. It is also not clear from the press release if this is station staff or drivers from the Heathrow express business unit within GwR (who AFAIK are under different terms and conditions to GwR staff)

If its the station staff it's possible that terminal 5 piccadilly line would have to close too as that's staffed by Heathrow express too

The OP mentions the RMT, so it won't be the drivers.

 

[Alvin_official]

If it's platform staff then what's to stop Heathrow Airport limited staff from working the platforms, or would they need rail based training?

 

[185143]

If it's platform staff then what's to stop Heathrow Airport limited staff from working the platforms, or would they need rail based training?

They insist on doing a pointless security check before allowing passengers to board normally.

I say pointless as it's not done on the CrossRail trains, just HEX, and when I was down there last week and the trains were late, it was quickly forgotten about.

I'd have thought HAL staff could go down there, but I'd assume they'd at least need to know how to make an emergency call to the signaller and how to stop a train in an emergency. It's not a particularly difficult thing to learn, but I'd have thought it'd still need to be done. That is if any of the regular HAL staff are willing to come in on their day off to break an RMT strike, without meaning to start a debate about that, I have no idea whatsoever how Unionised the aviation industry is compared to the railway.

 

[TFN]

Just to confirm it’s just the onboard staff and the staff at the ticket machine inside the terminals and Paddington.

The station staff at the Heathrow stations fall under a different umbrella and as mentioned above, drivers are GWR and trains are DOO.

There shouldn’t be any effect to service.

 

[168lover]

Station staff at Heathrow stations are employed directly by the airport, not hex or gwr

 

[Tazi Hupefi]

Just to confirm it’s just the onboard staff and the staff at the ticket machine inside the terminals and Paddington.

The station staff at the Heathrow stations fall under a different umbrella and as mentioned above, drivers are GWR and trains are DOO.

There shouldn’t be any effect to service.

Seems a somewhat ineffective strike, especially as most people will book/pay in advance or use Oyster/Contactless.

I'm surprised Heathrow hasn't followed the airline model and outsourced all their ancilliary operations like this to some minimum wage firm already. Not that I'm encouraging that, of course.

 

[dk1]

I'm surprised Heathrow hasn't followed the airline model and outsourced all their ancilliary operations like this to some minimum wage firm already. Not that I'm encouraging that, of course.

Wouldn’t be tolerated on the frontline railway.

 

[TFN]

Seems a somewhat ineffective strike, especially as most people will book/pay in advance or use Oyster/Contactless.

I'm surprised Heathrow hasn't followed the airline model and outsourced all their ancilliary operations like this to some minimum wage firm already. Not that I'm encouraging that, of course.

There was at some point a lot of agency staff at Heathrow Express but they moved away from that model in recent years.

The main effect of the strike might be the customers lost in upselling at Heathrow

 

[hwl]

Just to confirm it’s just the onboard staff and the staff at the ticket machine inside the terminals and Paddington.

The station staff at the Heathrow stations fall under a different umbrella and as mentioned above, drivers are GWR and trains are DOO.

There shouldn’t be any effect to service.

There was at some point a lot of agency staff at Heathrow Express but they moved away from that model in recent years.

The main effect of the strike might be the customers lost in upselling at Heathrow

So a strike actually resulting in an overall improvement for all passengers (including Crossrail and Piccadilly line) as there won't be harassive upsell?

I'll try to remember to have good look passenger usage at data (HEx, Crossrail and Picc.) to see what impact no sale staff have.

The pay deal probably reflects the situation that HEx marketshare is shrinking with less revenue to support cost base but the RMT can't face this kind of reality - Heathrow could easily go nuclear and ditech the expensive sale teams that are bringing in the sales anywhere near like they used to.