Transpennine woes and a moan...

[43096]

So a bean counter somewhere has asked the planners for a schedule which is optimised until the pips squeak? Rather than a balance of robustness and efficiency?

Or that it’s the usual “beancounter” reference from people who a) haven’t a clue how businesses are run and b) are looking for somebody to blame.

 

[VauxhallNova]

I don't think it is quite as easy as that now.

I think that TPE have got themselves in such a mess that it is almost impossible to recover from without drivers (in particular) working rest days again and a huge amount of goodwill from all concerned.

Both these things seem unlikely as the former is not down to TPE but down to DfT making funds available and Aslef allowing rest day working whilst still being in dispute about the issue of a pay increase.

You can cut the timetable down as much as you like to match what you can run with the available resources, but ultimately you need trains to run to be able to train new staff and for existing staff to retain competence. You can't train new drivers or retain skills of existing ones unless there are trains for them to drive.

And eventually you reach a point, which I think TPE has, where it is almost impossible to reconcile those matters - i.e. if you cut the timetable down without anything else changing, then it will just continue to get worse and worse.

Interesting, thankyou. Was it a similar situation in Dec 2019, when there weren't sufficient trained crews?

 

[Starmill]

This isn't a sudden issue today.

You mean that the statement put out by the company isn't a complete and correct version of events?

the shock!

 

[blackfive460]

TPE are an absolute joke. Something has to be done about this ASAP.

Something has needed to be done ASAP for quite a few years now. Don't hold your breath!

 

[Soundwave]

Or that it’s the usual “beancounter” reference from people who a) haven’t a clue how businesses are run and b) are looking for somebody to blame.

To be fair, I've scheduled passenger transport myself for over a decade, so I'm very well aware of scenarios thay superiors have asked for, knowing full well they wont work in reality.

 

[class 9]

Or that it’s the usual “beancounter” reference from people who a) haven’t a clue how businesses are run and b) are looking for somebody to blame.

I think it's more a reference to the fact that all decisions are being made with cost cutting the number 1 and only priority, out of the window goes timetable resilience and sod the passengers!

 

[DanNCL]

sod the passengers!

No doubt that’ll be the DFT’s next three word slogan!

 

[RHolmes]

This isn't a sudden issue today. The same issues existed in one for or another on Monday and Tuesday and also Monday last week.

There are diagrams where crew are rostered to trains which don't exist.

There are trains which do exist which have no one rostered to them.

The daily appearance sheets posted a week ago don't match up with the diagrams which are appearing in depots on a daily basis.

The obsession with optimised and efficient crew diagrams (on paper) means there are trains which have 3 or 4 crew changes en route, so as soon as 1 person is missing it causes chaos. On paper it looks good to the bean counters, but in reality it just doesn't work.

The diagrams have so many PASS rides on for crew that as soon as one train is missing then more than just one set of crew are in the wrong place.

They have trained a load of new drivers at one depot on a set of routes and traction, only to find, about 4 weeks before the December timetable change, that planning had moved a load of work around and they needed the drivers to drive different routes and traction, so they are no longer productive and have to start training on routes etc again.

The obsession with reducing and keeping route and traction knowledge between different depots and links down means then there is absolutely no cross cover ability and you may have staff but they don't sign the route or traction.

Add in that:

Morale is so low that front line staff generally have no interest in helping out

That there are various historical agreements with Aslef that means Drivers can't be shuffled around on the day to cover for staff shortages/ rostering errors without mutual agreement, which isn't always forthcoming

The RMT overtime ban is in place


And you have a perfect recipe for complete and utter chaos.

Although the above is usual correct todays issue was completely separate and a total failure of the IT systems

The data that is used to allocate crews, trains and diagrams for one reason or another became mis-aligned leading to trains having no crew, crew having no trains, and train crew controllers being completely unable to see where trains or crew actually were

 

[CAF397]

Which is where a Traincrew supervisor being present alongside the Controllers in control would be useful. At least an attempt at scheduling would have been made.

 

[Seehof]

I see TPE has many cancellations and part cancellations today. Are there still IT roster problems or have these been resolved and we are back to their usual “normal” service?

 

[DoubleO]

I see TPE has many cancellations and part cancellations today. Are there still IT roster problems or have these been resolved and we are back to their usual “normal” service?

81 cancellations and 36 amendments....that's TPE on a good day

 

[gazzaa2]

81 cancellations and 36 amendments....that's TPE on a good day

Why do they even bother?

 

[Man_with_beard]

I see this "IT issue" is dragging on for yet another day. This is no computer virus or software bug otherwise it would've been fixed by now.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I see this "IT issue" is dragging on for yet another day. This is no computer virus or software bug otherwise it would've been fixed by now.

Do we know what the issue is? Is it perhaps something like "the computer stuffed the rosters up, but they were agreed by the unions, so we have to do that whole process again, potentially taking weeks"?

 

[142blue]

Why are the cancellations not being posted on the website early morning. Used to be handy having the pdf as reference

 

[43096]

Do we know what the issue is? Is it perhaps something like "the computer stuffed the rosters up, but they were agreed by the unions, so we have to do that whole process again, potentially taking weeks"?

I seem to remember Regional Railways South Wales & West re-diagrammed almost all their stock and crews in the space of about 2 days after the Class 155 fleet was grounded. No software back then, but as with so many other parts of the railway, it was so much more responsive.

 

[nr758123]

Why are the cancellations not being posted on the website early morning. Used to be handy having the pdf as reference

They are being published on journeycheck the night before. I agree that it was easier to be able to refer to the pdf, but making things easier for passengers isn't something TPE have been doing much recently.

 

[CAF397]

Why are the cancellations not being posted on the website early morning. Used to be handy having the pdf as reference

Probably because the PDF list was always incorrect in that more were cancelled on the day. The journey check at least is updating throughout the day.

 

[Killingworth]

They are being published on journeycheck the night before. I agree that it was easier to be able to refer to the pdf, but making things easier for passengers isn't something TPE have been doing much recently.

Trainline have been showing cancellations when trains have run, the 7.07 from Sheffield for one. (It was 8 minutes late and got to Liverpool 22 down) Some users from Dore had rebooked in the Northern stopper, which was then held up and was consequently 6 minutes late itself into Manchester.

The 8.04 from Dore to Cleethorpes pulled in on time, seemingly ECS, no passengers! *See unadvertised express;
https://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/service/gb-nr:C84925/2022-12-22/detailed#allox_id=0

TPE trains are a menace to passengers and fellow operators alike at present.

*Edited to add RTT details

 

[Bikeman78]

This isn't a sudden issue today. The same issues existed in one for or another on Monday and Tuesday and also Monday last week.

There are diagrams where crew are rostered to trains which don't exist.

There are trains which do exist which have no one rostered to them.

The daily appearance sheets posted a week ago don't match up with the diagrams which are appearing in depots on a daily basis.

The obsession with optimised and efficient crew diagrams (on paper) means there are trains which have 3 or 4 crew changes en route, so as soon as 1 person is missing it causes chaos. On paper it looks good to the bean counters, but in reality it just doesn't work.

The diagrams have so many PASS rides on for crew that as soon as one train is missing then more than just one set of crew are in the wrong place.

They have trained a load of new drivers at one depot on a set of routes and traction, only to find, about 4 weeks before the December timetable change, that planning had moved a load of work around and they needed the drivers to drive different routes and traction, so they are no longer productive and have to start training on routes etc again.

The obsession with reducing and keeping route and traction knowledge between different depots and links down means then there is absolutely no cross cover ability and you may have staff but they don't sign the route or traction.

Add in that:

Morale is so low that front line staff generally have no interest in helping out

That there are various historical agreements with Aslef that means Drivers can't be shuffled around on the day to cover for staff shortages/ rostering errors without mutual agreement, which isn't always forthcoming

The RMT overtime ban is in place


And you have a perfect recipe for complete and utter chaos.

I think this sums up the current problems rather well. I don't understand how lots of crew changes makes diagrams more efficient though? Every time a driver a guard gets off a train, they are potentially waiting around to work the next train. Unless all the changovers are only five or 10 minutes, in which case the service will disintegrate at the first sign of trouble.

 

[northernman]

For noting, there appears to be an error in the NRE website whereby there is a 22:14 Leeds to York TPE service, it doesn't in fact exist, but is showing if you do an NRE journey search, but not showing on live departures or RTT. So if you're at Leeds and heading east, avoid the 22:14 because it doesn't exist. Apparently fixed next week.

 

[Solent&Wessex]

Do we know what the issue is? Is it perhaps something like "the computer stuffed the rosters up, but they were agreed by the unions, so we have to do that whole process again, potentially taking weeks"?

There was an internal note sent to some TPE staff yesterday. Having seen a copy I think there is a load of gibberish and waffle which makes no sense at all, but a telling bit is this:

".....It is obviously very important that those plans line up, we are currently in a process where we are updating that plan daily to make the best use of the train crew resources we can and deliver as many services for customers as we can....."

I suspect that they are trying to be clever by rejigging all the crew diagrams each day but then made a right pigs ear of it.

In addition a TPE source has said a rumour is doing the rounds that they have outsourced some of the short notice planning functions for each day, which has not gone well.

 

[JD2168]

At 12:30pm today a six car Class 185 was parked up not moving on platform 1B at Sheffield with a three car Class 185 was parked between platforms five & six, not really surprising when the only trains runners according to the National Rail app from Cleethorpes were at 8:26am, 10:26am, 12:26pm & 7:24pm.

 

[Killingworth]

At 12:30pm today a six car Class 185 was parked up not moving on platform 1B at Sheffield with a three car Class 185 was parked between platforms five & six, not really surprising when the only trains runners according to the National Rail app from Cleethorpes were at 8:26am, 10:26am, 12:26pm & 7:24pm.

There was a broken down freight train between Sheffield and Doncaster about that time which won't have helped.

 

[Peterthegreat]

There was a broken down freight train between Sheffield and Doncaster about that time which won't have helped.

66305 appears to have had problems in the Mexborough area working 6E42 07.35 Cliffe Hill to Doncaster. 2R24 11.05 Sheffield to Doncaster terminated at Mexborough and returned (empty?) to Sheffield.

 

[frodshamfella]

At Liverpool South Parkway, 15.30 Cleethorpes , Cancelled

 

[pokemonsuper9]

At Liverpool South Parkway, 15.30 Cleethorpes , Cancelled

Doesn't look like it was just the 15:30

 

[CHAPS2034]

From the Grauniad

Passengers are rightly angry about our northern railways – as a driver, I’m mortified | Secret Train Driver

TransPennine Express is not being straight with the public about a major cause of its cancellations, says the Secret Train Driver

www.theguardian.com

I’ve been with TransPennine Express (TPE) for quite a few years now and I love being a train driver. I used to thoroughly enjoy my job but now I am completely demoralised. We all are. It is embarrassing to talk to passengers when 20% or 30% of trains every day are being cancelled. On Wednesday they cancelled 226 services – that’s more than 60% of the whole timetable. The next day we hear that the government is putting fares up by 5.9%.

The excuses TPE gives just don’t add up: “This train has been cancelled because of a short-notice change to the timetable.” What does that mean? It’s cancelled because we’ve cancelled it.

Sometimes the train has already arrived at the station when it is suddenly cancelled. Sometimes passengers are already in their seats when it happens. It’s mortifying. These are people who just want to go to work, they want to go on holiday, or shopping with their family.

Part of the problem is that the train operating companies no longer get fined if they cancel trains, since the government effectively took over control of the railways during Covid. When I first started, if they cancelled a train they were fined thousands of pounds. Previously they would beg staff to work an extra hour or two, however long it took, to get a train to its destination, even if it was really delayed. We would say yes: it was an automatic answer. No problem. We’d do a couple of hours’ extra overtime. But that was when there was goodwill.

They’ve lost that flexibility because they have lost the goodwill of the staff. And that’s because they have been blaming us since the start of this year, blaming the cancellations on staff sickness, which is not the whole truth. Management were asked in a meeting about the real level of staff sickness, and it was only a percentage or two higher than last year. It doesn’t equate to 20% or 30% of all trains being cancelled.

Management also blame a training backlog because of Covid, but this isn’t a new thing. And anyway, we had Covid bubbles up and running during the pandemic, which meant that drivers could form bubbles with trainees while they learned the routes.

There is a lot of distrust because the management is not being straight with the public about what went wrong. On Wednesday they issued a “do not travel” warning because of an “IT failure”.

What they never talk about is their failure to negotiate a rest day working agreement. Until they do that, in return for fair pay and conditions, they are going to be short of staff to work. They keep saying they have more staff than ever before, but that doesn’t ring true: 74 have left this year alone.

They’ve also made changes that don’t make sense. TPE is split into regional depots and drivers from each depot used to be trained to work multiple routes, as well as diversionary routes. They’ve cancelled that, which means drivers and conductors are now qualified to work only parts of some routes – it beggars belief.

Take the line from Liverpool to Newcastle. Absolutely loads of those trains have been cancelled in recent months and that’s because TPE decided that, instead of one driver and one conductor working the whole route, they would split it into three. So the Liverpool drivers can only go as far as Leeds. Then a driver based in York will take the train from Leeds to York. And the Newcastle drivers take it from York to Newcastle. It used to require just 12 staff members to run that route for an entire day. Now it takes 36. It means there is a lot more to go wrong on each service. I don’t understand why they have done it. Maybe their planning department’s super computer said it would increase productivity and save a few pounds – but it doesn’t work.

Ask 90% of TPE staff if they would leave if they had a viable option to go to – and they would say yes.

The Secret Train Driver is a driver with TransPennine Express. As told to the Guardian’s north of England editor, Helen Pidd

 

[Killingworth]

From the Grauniad

Passengers are rightly angry about our northern railways – as a driver, I’m mortified | Secret Train Driver

TransPennine Express is not being straight with the public about a major cause of its cancellations, says the Secret Train Driver

www.theguardian.com

Well said that man. Currently it would almost be better for the industry and the travelling public if TPE left all trains in depots so they didn't get in the way of the others. Then they would know which of their services needed strengthening and we might all know what we could plan around.

Currently most travellers are planning to use their cars. After a long period of being warned not to use trains that's not too difficult. The rail using habit has been broken for too many.

 

[D6130]

OT....but I suspect that the majority of Avanti West Coast drivers probably feel the same way.