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Opinion
In the passenger seat
The public gets
what the public wants?
Anthony Smith considers the one-sided nature of the customer complaints process, which leaves
passengers feeling powerless
What do complaints tell you about an industry?
Passenger Focus takes on around 3,000 cases a
year where passengers are unhappy with how
the train company has handled their complaint.
The complaints we receive are a tiny subset of all those
made to train companies. Complaints are more often from
leisure passengers, who take less frequent journeys – usually
with higher one-off ticket prices, than from commuters.
East Coast, by no means the largest train company, has
again topped the league with over 770 complaints to us
in 2011-12. We are now working with it and other train
companies to reduce these figures. Virgin and First Great
Western followed with over 279 and nearly 240 respectively.
The main issues complained about? Fares and ticketing,
complaints handling, performance, and staff conduct
and availability.
Some companies take the view that it is best to take the
heat out of situations, say sorry and make a relatively generous
offer up front. Others view the whole exercise as a chance to
generate more revenue – the notion that someone might be a
loyal customer who has made an honest mistake seems alien.
Some have trouble in even replying.
That so many complaints are about the complaints process
itself is depressing. Familiar themes emerge: failure to read
or address the issues raised seems a common complaint. By
spending a lot of time and effort we are managing to get
nearly nine of our 10 passengers satisfied with the way we
have dealt with their complaint, if not the final outcome.
The attitude of
some train companies,
detailed in our recent
Ticket to Ride report, is
still feeding through
to the complaints
reaching us. Even
in the total absence
of intent passengers
are being hounded
to pay absurdly high
fines, often with the
threat of prosecution
thrown in. However,
discussions are taking
place with Atoc about
‘The train company
can run trains
late, short, with
no catering, no
information and no
staff - you have little
comeback’
drawing up an industry code of practice for how unpaid fares
notices are dealt with.
Customer service seems to have gone out the window,
thanks to the toxic mixture of high ‘fines’, guards incentivised
to collect the fines and the outsourcing (and consequent loss
of oversight) of revenue protection work. Train companies
need to urgently re-establish their grip on this most delicate
aspect of the passenger relationship.
It is easy to see how passengers become frustrated with the
one-sided nature of the relationship. When you buy a ticket,
you enter into a contract designed for very different times.
The train company can run trains late, short, with no
catering, no information and no staff – you have little
comeback. If you dare to forget to bring your railcard with
you they are on you like a ton of bricks. This is unfair and
unbalanced and leads to feelings of powerlessness and
frustration.
Most of the railway network is now operated by private
companies. Perhaps it is time to rip up some of the conditions
of carriage and byelaws and let train companies and passengers
have a normal consumer relationship?
Is it also right that the taxpayer has to fund the effort to
sort out train companies’ messes? There could be an argument
for moving to a ‘polluter pays’ model. Sad to say, often
threatening the bottom line forces change faster than more
reasoned intervention.
Anthony Smith is the chief executive of Passenger Focus.
september 2012 Page 19