First, let me point out that all the below is based on my personal experiences with the rail industry, mainly as a passenger (but also from reading in the media and also as an employee of an occasional contractor to certain TOCs - the latter gives me some communication with rail employees). I'm sure others have access to better information, and better facts, so feel free to correct and clarify, because I write purely as I see it:
I'll be honest, I don't see the problem. I have had problems with Virgin Trains on just as many occasions as I have with any other train operator. However, my opinions are formed with how they handle those problems. VT nearly always fails to deal with them in a suitable manner. I recall one occasion in particular where it took me five months to get a (partial) refund for a journey, where I got trapped in the middle of nowhere for five hours, thanks to VT staff advice and their poor management decisions, following a track blockage. I wrote to them about that single incident. They only replied a month later, after my third letter to them regarding that incident. They gave the same old denial that anything was wrong or that they were responsible. I wrote back to point out the facts that they overlooked/denied, and they didn't reply, so in the space of a month I wrote another few letters asking them to refer to my previous letter that they have seemed to have ignored. Eventually, they replied, but simply reworded their first reply, showing they had ignored the evidence and information I had given them! We carried on the correspondence for months, with me having to write three letters each time to get Virgin to reply. Eventually they agreed to refund my fare, but refused to accept fault or to apologise - stating that the refund was merely a "gesture of goodwill". I will point out to those not in the know, that if there's an infrastructure problem, the train operators are obliged to refund passengers, and in turn the train operators seek compensation from the infrastructure operator. I expect VT got their compensation, but weren't so keen to pass it on to me...
Its not the only time that they have tried to fob me off either.
On the other hand, when I consider First Great Western (a separate First Group franchise) I've found their immediate "incident response" to be pretty good (one example being coaches laid on within half an hour of a major line blockage, whereas Virgin had me wait four hours in a similar incident) and after-the-event complaints are dealt with in a swift and appropriate manner: You write once, they reply in a week or so with a refund, compensation or just a general apology, which ever is most appropriate.
People hold up First Capital Connect and First Great Western as two examples of why First shouldn't be running a rail franchise. Sure, their punctuality and reliability seems a little low on paper, but look at it this way - FCC and FGW both run on some of the most congested rail routes in the country. Not only that, but one morbid fact is that a third of all suicides on the UK rail network take place between Paddington and Slough - the critical stem of FGW's mainline and London suburban network. That in itself gives punctuality a major hit. In the extremities of its network, FGW (from what I understand) operates in fairly rural and under-developed/poorly invested routes. Given those bits of information, it comes as no surprise that they have poor reliability and punctuality figures. Customer satisfaction is fairly low for FGW and FCC is almost certainly down to the delays (and, in my experience, usually those delays are caused by the actions of British Transport Police, London Fire Brigade or Network Rail - not the colour of the train or the management itself). I seem to remember Thames Trains, Thameslink and WAGN suffering from similar problems and low customer satisfaction when they had the franchises that FGW and FCC have now.
Now lets also consider First TransPennine. I understand that it suffers from the same problems as CrossCountry (a former Virgin franchise). They are both relatively long distance operators, running through fairly busy hubs, crossing multiple timetabling regions and operating areas, but I understand that they have no timetabling priority in any of them, leading to longer journey times in general and regular delays. I would argue that this circumstance contributed to the poor levels of service that led to VT losing the XC franchise. In the same vein, I would suspect that FTPE suffers similarly low passenger opinion for the same reason. Also note that FTPE seems to be running expresses that have to be local trains too. An interesting concept, but leads to trains perceived as "slow".
With that in mind, I don't think its a good measure to compare passenger satisfaction on the WCML with satisfaction on the Great Western (includes former Thames Trains franchise), Thameslink, Transpennine and Great Northern franchises, which are all very different networks. In turn, I don't think its good to use differing passenger satisfaction levels on differing franchises as an argument for or against a particular TOC.
To those who have said that First has no idea how to run the WCML - I don't know: remember that nearly all of the current WCML staff will just put on a different uniform in the morning. Day to day management is unlikely to change, and the board will be taking advice from the same employee-advisors. I'm pretty sure that the successes that VT has had were most likely down to those permanent WCML staff. What defines VT as VT - the only factor that differentiates it from any other operator - is the board. VT's board is made up of people from a large conglomerate that seems to run its interests at arms length, leaving the actual management to its partners (Virgin - I mention the way they run things to note that they aren't a major rail powerhouse - its not a criticism) and a bus company that, in my experience, is pretty bad at running buses (Stagecoach). Yet if they managed to pull the WCML off, then whats to stop First pulling something out of the bag, if they replace that board, and considering the number of other rail franchises it operates?
Now its true, the WCML benefitted greatly from Virgin motivation and investment - I remember the old WCML - slow locomotive hauled trains with an odd and irregular service pattern. With Virgin's lead, we've seen a lot of investment and progress made on the WCML. But do note that ultimately the new trains (faster but also much less comfortable) are bought and owned by the ROSCOs (companies that lease trains to rail operators - they won't change with the franchise) and the infrastructure is owned and maintained by the state (via Network Rail).
I'm not dead against Virgin Trains, nor am I supporter of First - I just don't think they are as wonderful as has been made out (nor is First as bad as has been made out) by those "mourning" the loss.
First put in a big offer - the Government bought it. Lets face it, the treasury is as good as empty, and cuts are being made across the board. As we've seen with universities, we'll be seeing a transfer of financial burden from state subsidy to those who actually use the services. Its no wonder that the government wants the big offer. I don't know if First will flounder as a result of that, as some have predicted. Its one of the largest and seemingly most successful transport companies in the UK. Its also based in Scotland, meaning that it seems likely to me that the Scottish government will subsidise it to improve cross-border services. The ECML has seen a string of problem operators and has been renationalised: but remember that they were being run by much smaller companies, that were newcomers into the rail industry - small fish in a big pond (SeaContainers - a shipping company, and National Express - a coach and commuter company). I don't expect First to go the same way.
I can't help but thinking that the bad press and feeling seems to be drummed up by VT and Richard Branson being a bit of a sore loser...
Also, just to comment on a few things above:
Have any of you ridden First's trains? Can you compare them to VT?
I may be reading too much into it - but just to confirm that you are aware - aside from paint scheme, the trains themselves probably won't change. They are leased to the franchise operator by other companies (usually subsidiaries of large banks).
I wonderz what firsts WCML franchise will be named. 
They have registered "Horizon" with Companies House - but that will be the registered name, not necessarily the name it will trade under. I suspect they will stick to FirstGroup form and go with "First West Coast". They may even resurrect the name "First North Western" - anybody remember them?
Or they may even run the WCML and GWML as separate units under the same brand - using the First Great Western brand. Geographically, it fits - even if we "lovingly" refer to that as "Worst Late Western".
Ive been on Virgin Trains and First Transpennine Express. Im assuming all first branches are similar, I am very dissapointed, when I went from Manchester Piccadilly to London Euston on VT it way really good, when I went on Manchester Piccadilly to Blackpool North I wasn't too impressed. A loss to the british railways 
There will be significant service differences between a relatively short "local" route, and a long distance mainline route. I don't suspect for a minute that the WCML will be run in the same way as the regional or suburban franchises are (FTPE and FCC).
Edited by BritAbroad, 16 August 2012 - 11:57 PM.
Minor clarifications
Sign In
Create Account
This topic is locked
Back to top
