2019 - TransWilts cancellation and amendments log

[whole diary]

[grahame]

Pulling every so slightly back on topic ... here is today's Melksham log

Code:

Scheduled calls at Melksham Station

Today
20:22	Westbury		a shortage of train crew
19:57	Cheltenham Spa	On time	-
19:00	Swindon		a shortage of train crew
18:21	Westbury		a shortage of train crew
17:07	Swindon		a shortage of train crew
15:53	Westbury		a shortage of train crew
14:50	Swindon		a shortage of train crew
14:04	Weymouth		a shortage of train crew
12:52	Swindon		a shortage of train crew
11:53	Westbury		a shortage of train crew
10:46	Swindon		a shortage of train crew
09:47	Westbury		a shortage of train crew
08:36	Swindon		a shortage of train crew

19:57 is re-instated ... of course, that's an important train because it also serves Swindon to Gloucester and Cheltenham  .  I would expect a poor loading - little return traffic from people who hoped to go out earlier in the day, with others put off because it was flagged as cancelled online for quite a number of hours.

Now - I don't know if they were short of drivers, or conductors, or both.   But assuming it was just one of the two, that's 2 members of staff down leading to the disruption / loss of between 600 and 800 journeys - perhaps 400 to 500 different individual.  Not very clever PR^▸ (Public Relations), not clever for the economy of the area, but seeing as the fares aren't all that high and it costs a lot to run a train, probably no great financial impact.  The irony is that I expect that at least two road drivers earned themselves a nice wage / income today.

[stuving]

Are there any penalties in the franchise letting / agreement from a financial aspect regarding cancelled trains.

Yes, there is. I tried to makes sense of it before, with limited success. It's roughly as follows:

The performance figures used for calculating bonus and penalty payments are minutes delay and cancellations. Each has a payment based on it, scaled from the difference between the annual average and a target, range limited between a cap and a floor. That difference is multiplied by a sum of money, which is not blanked out in the contract as most other actual amounts are. So far so logical - though they've done it "floor over cap", for some reason.

"Cancellations" is (subject to confirmation*) the total cancellations plus half the part-cancellations, excepting certain exceptions, as a percentage. I can't find any figures for this metric (or minutes delay). ORR^» (Office of Rail and Road formerly Office of Rail Regulation - about) track PPM^‡(resolve) and CASL, while GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) publish punctuality and reliability percentages (as in II's graphs). Obviously these are related, but exactly how is unclear.

This year's target for cancellations is 0.44%, and the floor is 0.55%. The actual, I'm sure, is way higher than that. In fact, I suspect it's higher than the default level in the contract - that is currently 1.1%, having jumped up from 0.72% in August 2018 (the target and floor didn't step up). The contract allows DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) a lot of discretion in how they react to that kind of thing - in GWR's case they set up the "Western Route Supervisory Board", and may claim that's all they need to do.

The upshot is that GWR are paying the full extra amount, and the actual cancellations rate won't matter until it gets down much lower. The payment per percent is higher because CASL is above target (how would it not be?) - and is £11,737,325, uprated by RPI^▸ (Revenue Protection Inspector (or Retail Price Index, depending on the context)) from 2015. Since the number it multiples is only 0.11, the final amount is roughly £1.44M.

* If anyone wants to check up on this in the updated franchise agreement (contract), it's all in schedule 7.1 from page 380 on.

[IndustryInsider]

Simples. 

[grahame]

Are there any penalties in the franchise letting / agreement from a financial aspect regarding cancelled trains.

Yes, there is. I tried to makes sense of it before, with limited success. It's roughly as follows:

Translated into summary terms ... current cancellation rates are so high that penalties are "off the scale" - at a maximum beyond which there are no further financial penalties for doing even worse, and so high that even reducing them significantly is not going to reduce the penalties. Have I read that right??

The reputational cost is huge - with each train crew GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) are short of on a shift, around 200 to 250 different people having their plans disrupted - many significantly where there isn't simply another train along within 30 or 60 minutes.   

[grahame]

12:20 Westbury to Swindon due 13:02
12:20 Westbury to Swindon due 13:02 will be cancelled.
This is due to a shortage of train crew.
Additional Information
Customers at Westbury and Trowbridge travelling to Chippenham or Swindon should travel on the 12:47 Gloucester service (12:53 from Trowbridge) and change at Bath Spa for the 13:43 service to London Paddington which calls at Chippenham (13:54) and Swindon at 14:10.

Customers at Westbury and Trowbridge travelling to Melksham should contact station staff or use the Customer Help-Point.

Customers at Melksham will be provided road transport to Chippenham from the station car park.

[grahame]

and another two ...

13:29 Swindon to Westbury due 14:10
13:29 Swindon to Westbury due 14:10 will be cancelled.
This is due to a shortage of train crew.
Additional Information
Customers at Swindon and Chippenham travelling to Trowbridge or Westbury should travel on the 14:00 Bristol Temple Meads service from Swindon (14:14 from Chippenham) and change at Bath Spa for the 14:35 service towards Portsmouth Harbour which calls at Trowbridge (14:53) and Westbury (15:00).

Customers travelling to Melksham should change at Chippenham and speak to station staff.

Customers at Melksham will be provided road transport from the station car park.

14:10 Frome to Swindon due 15:07
14:10 Frome to Swindon due 15:07 will be cancelled.
This is due to a shortage of train crew.
Additional Information
Customers at Frome should travel on the 14:42 Gloucester service and change at Bath Spa for the 15:43 London Paddington service which calls at Chippenham at 15:54 and Swindon at 16:10.

Customers at Westbury and Trowbridge travelling to Chippenham or Swindon should travel on the 14:10 Cardiff Central service (14:17 from Trowbridge) and change at Bath Spa for the 14:43 service to London Paddington which calls at Chippenham (14:54) and Swindon at 15:10.

Customers at Westbury and Trowbridge travelling to Melksham should contact station staff or use the Customer Help-Point.

Customers at Melksham will be provided road transport to Chippenham from the station car park.

[grahame]

And while I'm in this thread ...

12:49 Swindon to Frome due 13:41
12:49 Swindon to Frome due 13:41 will be terminated at Westbury.
It will no longer call at Frome.
This is due to a shortage of train crew.

[grahame]

Getting worse ...

Train Cancellations
12:20 Westbury to Swindon due 13:02
13:29 Swindon to Westbury due 14:10
14:10 Frome to Swindon due 15:07
15:19 Swindon to Westbury due 16:00
16:21 Westbury to Swindon due 17:03
18:32 Westbury to Swindon due 19:21
20:08 Swindon to Westbury due 20:49

[bobm]

... and the only seven in GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) land. 

I notice the 17:36 isn’t cancelled yet despite the inward working not running.  I wonder if someone has a plan for that. 

[grahame]

... and the only seven in GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) land. 

I notice the 17:36 isn’t cancelled yet despite the inward working not running.  I wonder if someone has a plan for that. 

I wondered that too.

Interesting to note the far better directions being put up on Journeyheck (though this is treating the symptoms and not providing a cure).    But the suggested alternative puts people an hour and nine minutes late into Swindon!

16:21 Westbury to Swindon due 17:03
16:21 Westbury to Swindon due 17:03 will be cancelled.
This is due to a shortage of train crew.
Additional Information
Customers at Westbury and Trowbridge travelling to Chippenham or Swindon should travel on the 16:43 Gloucester service (16:48 from Trowbridge) and change at Bath Spa for the 17:44 service to London Paddington which calls at Chippenham (17:55) and Swindon at 18:12.

[Timmer]

Rail replacement buses operating between Chippenham and Westbury now appearing on Journeycheck.

[grahame]

... and the only seven in GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) land. 

I notice the 17:36 isn’t cancelled yet despite the inward working not running.  I wonder if someone has a plan for that. 

Gone now ...

17:36 Swindon to Westbury due 18:18
17:36 Swindon to Westbury due 18:18 will be cancelled.
This is due to a shortage of train crew.
Additional Information
Customers at Swindon travelling to Trowbridge or Westbury should travel on the 18:00 Bristol Temple Meads service from Swindon and change at Bath Spa for the 18:36 service towards Portsmouth Harbour which calls at Trowbridge (18:54) and Westbury (19:01).

Rail Replacement transport has been arranged to run in place of this service between Chippenham and Westbury. Please see station signage for the Rail Replacement pick up location.

Alternative suggestion puts people 43 minutes late into Trowbridge and Westbury.  So misses Frome and Weymouth connections ... Weymouth arrival back from 20:10 to 23:13.   Passengers for Warminster and beyond ... stay on the train on which they arrive at Westbury.

[grahame]

14:10 Frome to Swindon due 15:07
14:10 Frome to Swindon due 15:07 will be reinstated.
It will be terminated at Westbury.
It will no longer call at Trowbridge, Melksham, Chippenham and Swindon.
This is due to a shortage of train crew.

[Robin Summerhill]

So let me get this straight...

Sunday 18th August - 13 trains booked to call at Melksham, 12 cancelled and one ran.

Monday 19th August - they've got no crew for the afternoon trains so nothing stops at Melksham (7 cancellations) between 1314 and 1915 (the Cheltenham to Southampton is on its way as I type). Then presumably nothing for the rest of the day.

How long do GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) think they can get away with this fiasco of a service before passengers start to vote with their feet?

[rogerw]

Surely it has got to the stage where top management should be issuing a public apology together with details of what is being done to address the problem