How critical is the return of passengers and busy trains for railway jobs?

[Harold Hill]

City-to-city driving will likely become less attractive with more and more ultra-low emission zones being introduced.

As for leisure travel returning, until the mask mandate is discontinued there will be plenty who are not interested

 

[bramling]

You could argue that they do. It's not a rocket science job but it's not always the piece of cake job some seem to think; needing to think on your feet; planning journeys for people; selling the correct ticket in a complex fares structure; handling disruption well. To do the job efficiently wouldn't be as practical on the platform.

I don't think guards are overpaid, but drivers will need to take a substantial pay cut before any compulsory redundancies within railway; particularly those who work for Avanti, LU and similar.

How insulated the driving grade is will depend on what happens with demand and how many services the powers that be decide need to be operated. With the training hiatus of the last year, many places are going to be short of drivers for some time to come, and it will take quite a cut in timetables to get to the point where everything balances again.

Driver is still one of the grades which will emerge relatively unscathed from this, for all the usual reasons. Anything to do with signalling (either signaller itself or some of the maintenance functions) is also pretty safe IMO. Similar for incident response, though this could be meddled with, but is still vital in some form.

Station staff is on slightly thinner ice, but again the trend has tended to go the other way in recent years. My local station, for example, in the 1990s had one supervisor and one or two booking office staff on duty for most of the day. Fast forwards and there’s just as many in the booking office, normally at least two on the gateline (often more), and at least two customer service / dispatch staff, plus often a “railway enforcement officer” patrolling. For something like London Overground the extra staffing is even more noticeable, though by contrast LU has tended to reduce staffing levels slightly over the last decade.

The difficulty with saving costs on the railway is that so much is fixed. Removing a shed load of services from the timetable doesn’t make that much of a saving, especially in the short term.

 

[Wolfie]

You also have to also ask, is there a case for sweating the market, and jacking the fares up to the maximum the market could bear?!

Maybe then we could smarten the place up a tad? Let’s get some high quality people onto the trains we operate, rather then the low income dross we currently convey?

Asking the taxpayer to subsidise the railway while insulting a large proportion of them as "low income dross" will not go well.... An epic Daily Mail test fail!

Taxpayer subsidised services must be accessible to all.

The optics of the situation will also need to be considered, particularly as Government is so closely involved in managing the railway.

Charging silly amounts of money whilst half the train remains empty looks a lot worse.

Absolutely.

Lol. Go on, define ‘quality’ and ‘dross’ in this context for us all.

Indeed.

 

[MissPWay]

I don't think guards are overpaid, but drivers will need to take a substantial pay cut before any compulsory redundancies within railway; particularly those who work for Avanti, LU and similar. As mentioned RDW can be cut first too.

However much it irks the failed drivers and generally envious on here, it’s still the hardest grade to replace (although not impossible) with a touchscreen computer or VDU monitor without spending a few billion pounds.

Asking the taxpayer to subsidise the railway while insulting a large proportion of them as "low income dross" will not go well.... An epic Daily Mail test fail!

Taxpayer subsidised services must be accessible to all.

I don’t think it was a serious comment.

But also, if we consider the lack of tax on aviation fuel to be a form of subsidy then do we insist that air travel is accessible to all?

 

[Wolfie]

I don't think guards are overpaid, but drivers will need to take a substantial pay cut before any compulsory redundancies within railway; particularly those who work for Avanti, LU and similar. As mentioned RDW can be cut first too.

I'm not sure what LU has to do with this. Certainly passenger loadings have dropped on the tube but there is lots of evidence that is only a relatively temporary thing.

But also, if we consider the lack of tax on aviation fuel to be a form of subsidy then do we insist that air travel is accessible to all?

Changing that is rather difficult as it needs to be done internationally.

 

[vikingdriver]

Which non-front line jobs are on the chopping board?

There will be some need for booking office staff, especially if focus goes towards best practice of customer service (which it should), those who aren't comfortable with technology still use them and it's always good to speak to someone if you're unsure RE tickets. Station staff would still be required, they pay for themselves in revenue protection and customer help. Where else? Head office - I'm not sure how many jobs you can slash there because when it has happened in the past, mistakes are made as people end up doing more than they are either skilled to do or have the capacity to do. More technology means more IT work. Maybe some marketing roles? But even then there should be a massive push on getting people back on rail.

I hate to say it, but I think it will be the complete opposite, especially if patronage decreases. Say it goes own 20-25%, there will be service cuts and the DfT will certainly look at reducing rest day working, it's all but banned at the moment. TOC's already have drivers/conductors sitting at home doing nothing and they are a significant outlay of money - what's the average wage for a driver? 55k, without extras. Conductors? 30k, again without extras. If, and when, there are service cuts - they're the ones that will be hit. There simply won't be the work for them.

We have anything from 5-6 to around 10-12 drivers working on their day off each day, with this reduced timetable, at my depot alone. There really isn't anyone sat at home, anyone who can drive, is driving.

 

[Philip]

However much it irks the failed drivers and generally envious on here, it’s still the hardest grade to replace (although not impossible) with a touchscreen computer or VDU monitor without spending a few billion pounds.


I don’t think it was a serious comment.

But also, if we consider the lack of tax on aviation fuel to be a form of subsidy then do we insist that air travel is accessible to all?

Not really a case of being envious; I appreciate the responsibility and skills needed and the commitment to a good working ethic both in the training and on the job. Sure, it deserves to be paid substantially more than station jobs, but the £60k plus paid driving jobs are still overpaid. I think the salary Northern drivers have would be more suitable across the board.

 

[deltic]

Many executives within my organisation are NOT returning back to the railway.
First Class fares are now way too expensive, on-board service and qaulity is very poor especially with the new InterCity trains. Parking charges at stations are far too high and overall the train is not cost effective. Green issues of rail are not relevant.

Travel by rail is now discourged as the business is investing in a good number of high spec company cars with the enhanced premiums to staff to offset company car tax. I'm looking forward to the car next month - no masks, greater comfort and qaulity, covid secure with city centre parking availability. Roadside catering offers better quality catering than the railway.

The railway will not see the return of so many passengers as pre covid. That's history now and railways will be in decline.

Not the news that railway supporters will want to hear but it is reality. I for one will only be making a handful of trips by rail compared to pre covid.

Interesting company view

My company bans driving on business unless there is no other alternative, on safety grounds. As with many many other companies dealing with processes/activities that may be regarded as far more risky than your average office job, the biggest health and safety issue is related to driving.

Along with many other companies we are also moving to net zero carbon hence again pushing people away from less sustainable travel. This to the extent where rail journeys that are more expensive than flying and take longer are being encouraged, when also taking into account the ability to work on trains is far more productive than time spend faffing around airports and certainly driving the real cost is usually in fact lower.

 

[nlogax]

one quick way finance directors react to savings is to cut business travel. Many businesses will be under pressure once government support across the economy winds down.

Accurate. I know of companies where T&E budgets have been reduced or cut entirely for the first half of this calendar year in expectation of a very slow return to partial normality. Employees in those companies thinking they'll be able to return to seeing clients or having remote meetings bookened by a few drinks in the local pub and a couple of hours on the train will be sorely disappointed.

 

[miami]

One trip from London to Manchester costs £510 which is eye watering. Advance tickets are useless as they have no flexibility.
The monthly lease payments plus tax implications are considerably less. Given that several journeys are made each month the cost of railway travel is too expensive.

You're right about the price, but given the cost of hiring a car I'd be surprised if the risk and hassle of leasing pool cars makes it worthwhile. I'm really surprised you're giving them to individuals and attracting the tax implications too.

Padded time? So you'd expect people to let several trains go after a full day of work, facing a three hour plus journey home? Glad I didn't work there.

Quite, although there's a lot of pressure to kill the golden egg (those paying £125/hour in first, or £90/hour in standard) to cater for those on £10/hour advanced tickets via things like compulsory reservations.

City-to-city driving will likely become less attractive with more and more ultra-low emission zones being introduced.

Enterprise will rent me a Tesla Model S or similar for £188 for two days, and corporate deal means they'll drop it off at my house and pick it up for free. Either way as the branch is next to the station, getting to/from the branch is no different to the train.

A return to London from Crewe in Standard is £284.

Now there are benefits of the train
1) I can have a few beers before coming back
2) It's between 30-60 minutes faster end-to-end
3) I can have a few beers before coming back
4) No parking charges

I can easily see how the calculation falls the other way though

 

[Ianno87]

As for leisure travel returning, until the mask mandate is discontinued there will be plenty who are not interested

Balanced against the proportion of the population who (rightly or wrongly) feel safer and more confidently travelling because of masks.

 

[dctraindriver]

Which non-front line jobs are on the chopping board?

There will be some need for booking office staff, especially if focus goes towards best practice of customer service (which it should), those who aren't comfortable with technology still use them and it's always good to speak to someone if you're unsure RE tickets. Station staff would still be required, they pay for themselves in revenue protection and customer help. Where else? Head office - I'm not sure how many jobs you can slash there because when it has happened in the past, mistakes are made as people end up doing more than they are either skilled to do or have the capacity to do. More technology means more IT work. Maybe some marketing roles? But even then there should be a massive push on getting people back on rail.

I hate to say it, but I think it will be the complete opposite, especially if patronage decreases. Say it goes own 20-25%, there will be service cuts and the DfT will certainly look at reducing rest day working, it's all but banned at the moment. TOC's already have drivers/conductors sitting at home doing nothing and they are a significant outlay of money - what's the average wage for a driver? 55k, without extras. Conductors? 30k, again without extras. If, and when, there are service cuts - they're the ones that will be hit. There simply won't be the work for them.

I have not sat spare at home and I’m not a one off.....

 

[The Planner]

You can travel from Crewe to London for prices varying from £18.50 to £125 one way, it all depends on the time of day you travel.
Why do posters always post the most expensive fare as an example, if you travel off peak there's huge discounts available.

People always say to use Avanti but London northwestern services are only slightly slower but far cheaper.
I've driven a car into London once & it was a nightmare, that was before all the congestion charge started.

Most posters always use the worst case scenario as examples, people say use a car to Travel into a city but that's not practical for many travellers.

If you can arrange meetings to allow that then great, but to get a valuable amount of time elsewhere you are often automatically in that peak open fare territory.

 

[bramling]

Not really a case of being envious; I appreciate the responsibility and skills needed and the commitment to a good working ethic both in the training and on the job. Sure, it deserves to be paid substantially more than station jobs, but the £60k plus paid driving jobs are still overpaid. I think the salary Northern drivers have would be more suitable across the board.

The disparity in driver pay between the various TOCs is perhaps more of an issue than “drivers are overpaid”. Something is clearly amiss when you have, for example, such a big difference between GTR and neighbouring Southeastern.

 

[43066]

It’s interesting you’ve had this thought, as similar has crossed my mind. There’s a lot of talk here about how “leisure travel” will lead any rail usage revival, however I’m not sure how true this, when we consider that a lot of such travel is (1) short distance, (2) low fare, and (3) quite dependent on factors like season or weather.

Surely going for what remaining level of the business market is available is the way to go. There’s still plenty who would be open to switching from car to rail in the right circumstances.

Certainly a tricky one to call. I get the impression that a lot of the railway’s fare income is reliant on season ticket holders. People buying advanced tickets for a pittance and/or travelling occasionally and for short distances won’t make much of a dent.

The difficulty with saving costs on the railway is that so much is fixed. Removing a shed load of services from the timetable doesn’t make that much of a saving, especially in the short term.

Absolutely. Plus the fact that, if you’re going to have a railway at all, it needs to operate regular services in order to be useful. There’s not much of a saving to be made by short forming trains etc.

Job security wise I’d be most worried if I worked in a ticket office, especially in the London area. I’d have said the same thing pre Covid.

 

[Watershed]

Why do posters always post the most expensive fare as an example, if you travel off peak there's huge discounts available.

Taking Crewe-London as an example, a day-trip done with an Off-Peak Return means you can't arrive into London before 12pm, and if you miss the 14:40 you have to wait until the 19:10. Not exactly very convenient!

The only flexible alternative is an Anytime Single. And whilst you can get Advances on the day, they tend not to cost much less than their flexible counterparts.

 

[Purple Orange]

Taking Crewe-London as an example, a day-trip done with an Off-Peak Return means you can't arrive into London before 12pm, and if you miss the 14:40 you have to wait until the 19:10. Not exactly very convenient!

The only flexible alternative is an Anytime Single. And whilst you can get Advances on the day, they tend not to cost much less than their flexible counterparts.

There is a point though. Many posters quote first class fares to embellish their point. If someone is opting to choose First class as a preference, drive as 2nd preference then standard class as 3rd preference, I question why.

 

[dctraindriver]

The TOC I work for has had RDW even with our services reduced to 60%, this week we are back to 95% and have all RDW volunteers used plus cross depot cover & still have jobs uncovered.

A lot of posters have a real lack of knowledge regarding how the railways are ran, tocs run under complement of staff to save money. They rely on RDW to run services as a norm, it's the way the system works.

To stop this all depots would need multiple spare traincrew every day just sitting around incase they are required. Running a railway is far more complicated than many people outside the industry realise.

Well said. Today I’m covering work that another depot cannot cover. It’s pretty constant to be honest. Yesterday was the same, another depots work. I’m absolutely fine with it, I just wanted to highlight for the majority of guards and drivers we are keeping busy.

 

[bramling]

Certainly a tricky one to call. I get the impression that a lot of the railway’s fare income is reliant on season ticket holders. People buying advanced tickets for a pittance and/or travelling occasionally and for short distances won’t make much of a dent.

Exactly. Whilst it will no doubt soon prove quite possible to fill a Sprinter heading to somewhere like the MetroCentre, and soon no doubt to somewhere like Skegness beach, this isn’t going to address the revenue gap which Covid has created.

Absolutely. Plus the fact that, if you’re going to have a railway at all, it needs to operate regular services in order to be useful. There’s not much of a saving to be made by short forming trains etc.

Job security wise I’d be most worried if I worked in a ticket office, especially in the London area. I’d have said the same thing pre Covid.

Yes booking office is an obvious one. Personally I’d more look at some of the security-type roles which seem to have exploded over the last couple of years.

 

[anthony263]

Bit of warm.sunshine in south wales and our buses are starting to struggle mow with passenger numbers. Certainly people in wes are glad to be going out.

I do think social distancing needs to be reduced to 1m then from June scrapped all together

 

[Philip]

Exactly. Whilst it will no doubt soon prove quite possible to fill a Sprinter heading to somewhere like the MetroCentre, and soon no doubt to somewhere like Skegness beach, this isn’t going to address the revenue gap which Covid has created.




Yes booking office is an obvious one. Personally I’d more look at some of the security-type roles which seem to have exploded over the last couple of years.

When you look at the queues for travel centres at London Euston, Manchester Piccadilly, New Street etc, along with busy station booking offices, do you not think passengers would struggle to cope if these were cut?

 

[deltic]

You can travel from Crewe to London for prices varying from £18.50 to £125 one way, it all depends on the time of day you travel.
Why do posters always post the most expensive fare as an example, if you travel off peak there's huge discounts available.

People always say to use Avanti but London northwestern services are only slightly slower but far cheaper.
I've driven a car into London once & it was a nightmare, that was before all the congestion charge started.

Most posters always use the worst case scenario as examples, people say use a car to Travel into a city but that's not practical for many travellers.

London NorthWestern is about an hour longer than Avanti

It is often possible to book an Advance single in the peak even the day before and then an off-peak single return which reduces the cost in the case of Crewe-London by around £100 and still provides flexibility for the return. Albeit this is a lot easier for journeys in the opposite direction due to London's evening off-peak fare restrictions.

 

[bramling]

When you look at the queues for travel centres at London Euston, Manchester Piccadilly, New Street etc, along with busy station booking offices, do you not think passengers would struggle to cope if these were cut?

Yes, but that doesn’t mean it won’t happen.

Covid is already doing a pretty good job at stripping all the nice things out of life, after all.

 

[Starmill]

Why do posters always post the most expensive fare as an example, if

Why do people always try to contradict the prices quoted by giving a price which is only available when booked well in advance with no refunds and a fee to make any changes? Or alternatively quote a price which simply not be available for the sort of time range one is working in.

The only flexible alternative is an Anytime Single. And whilst you can get Advances on the day, they

Precisely. Same goes for booking a few days in advance. Any earlier and you risk the ticket being booked at an inconvenient time and needing to pay a change fee.

 

[yorksrob]

Indeed. I think the railway puts too much rigmorole onto the passenger in trying to find reasonable fares. It needs to be able to accommodate more spontenaety without being eye watering.

 

[miami]

Why do posters always post the most expensive fare as an example, if you travel off peak there's huge discounts available.

Because that's the train I travel on with the flexibility I need, and clearly I'm not alone as other people travel on the "peak" trains. There isn't even a through ticket from my local station on the slow train so it's a split ticket with all the hassle that brings.

If I need to go to London, I either buy the ticket the day before (or on the walk to the station), which even now with nobody using the train means no advanced tickets. It currently means leaving home at 0750 to get the 0815 train to crewe to change to the 0843 getting into Euston at 10:17 and to the office for 10:45. £142 one way. If I decide to beer it in the evening (from April 12th onwards) I can get a £60 off peak single to get back. Of course with covid timetable the last train is leaving at 1830 to get the 1910 getting me home for 2145, otherwise it's another £20 for a taxi home, so in reality I'll stay overnight. In pre-covid times this would be the 2010 or 2110 getting home really late.

If I'm not beering then I'll want to be leaving on the 1710 to be home for 1950 to see the kids before they go to sleep, or maybe the 1810.

So with beer that's £200 in standard, without beer that's £280.

Alternatively I order a car to be delivered the night before for £60, I leave at 7AM, I'm parked in London Q-Park (c. £30) on the Marylebone road for about 1030, so it's about an hour slower. Another £60 for petrol, so still cheaper than the peak+off-peak trip, and far far cheaper than peak+peak.

On the way back I leave office at 1630, in car for 1700, back for 2045. leave at 1600 though and I'm back for 2015. That's the problem with the train -- if I leave at just the right minute I can get the shortest time. If I leave at the wrong time it adds an hour to the trip.

So yes, it's worth the train - even with the extra price - it saves 2 hours on the trip

The value of open tickets are flexibility and speed. Remove those (by travelling on LNWR or booking in advance for an £80 ticket instead of £160) and the pendulum swings.

Crucially for the industry -- these pricey tickets are the ones that make the money. People have, in the past, paid £500 return for Manchester-London. How likely will it be for those those lucrative peak time tickets to be used in future, when travelling for a day is less important, and travel is for connections (so more of an occasion) rather than just quick meetings?

Imagine this world where the railfans win and everyone books in advance on "cheap" tickets or travels "off peak". That means revenues collapse even more, and the railway can't afford that. Imagine where the value of the standard open tickets is diluted with compulsory reservations, that means more people drive or fly instead.

To reduce subsidies, the railway needs either
1) passengers to spend more per passegner
2) more passengers to travel

(2) is not going to happen post covid - at least some meetings will no longer be in person, at least some people will no longer commute as often as before, so how is the railway going to get more money from passengers? Already high prices for peak trains are competing with flights (at least from Manchester + Scotland) and cars. They mainly win on time for single travellers. If you have a team of 3 going to an important meeting from Manchester to London to seal the deal on selling a dohicky. You could spend £1500 on a day return for your team on the train - and hopefully you'll get a semi-private table where you can discuss stuff on the way, or you could instead drive down in a fancy car you hire for £300 return including parking, spend £400 on a hotel, and have £500 to spend on a nice preparatory meal the night before.

 

[Bikeman78]

If last summer is used an example the trains will be full to bursting this summer once the holidays seasons start.

The trains were very busy & social distancing was very much ignored by lots of travellers.
Many people still don't wear masks aswell, just go to your local supermarket to see that.

Plus the vast majority of people are booking staycations, I can see the trains being very very busy this year.

Agreed. Anyone expecting a double seat to themselves on the North Wales Coast this summer will be sorely disappointed.

 

[HSTEd]

2) more passengers to travel

(2) is not going to happen post covid - at least some meetings will no longer be in person, at least some people will no longer commute as often as before,

I'm not at all convinced that this is true.

Transport demand is one of the most price sensitive things I can imagine in existance.
Especially when HS2 puts a huge number of people very close to major load centres (London etc).

If cheap, rapid transport is available, people will inevitably build lifestyles that use it - this has happened throughout human history.

I think a model that drives demand sky high with low fares, primarily using crowding to control passenger numbers, could work and deliver relatively low subsidies.

 

[Purple Orange]

I'm not at all convinced that this is true.

Transport demand is one of the most price sensitive things I can imagine in existance.
Especially when HS2 puts a huge number of people very close to major load centres (London etc).

If cheap, rapid transport is available, people will inevitably build lifestyles that use it - this has happened throughout human history.

I think a model that drives demand sky high with low fares, primarily using crowding to control passenger numbers, could work and deliver relatively low subsidies.

This is seen in our urban transit systems.

 

[dk1]

Good to see so many taking advantage of the glorious weather today. Trains to the coast are extremely well loaded once again.