Great Western Coffee Shop

XC have long had a twitter account, but until recently, wasn't manned (permanently) and only used for marketing.

As of yesterday, it's now properly manned 0700-2200 (slightly different on Sundays) and they seem to be interacting well.

Suspect it's being run by an agency, as the same bods appear on the new Great Central feed too!

Heavens, have I missed something major in the world of franchising? Or is that the new name for HS2?

XC and Grand Central are both part of the Arriva group and I believe they share some head office functions. Possible that they have a joint internal Twitter team.

Maybe so, but that wasn't what was posted.

Both are being run by XC staff in XC towers in Birmingham.  Confirmed to me by a member of staff in said towers.

Great Central???

Have you never made a typo?!! Pushing that a tad hard?

Yes of course I have, but neither poster appeared to have picked up the point I was making.

I had realised the error, but I assumed it was just a typo and was meant to refer to Grand Central.

I'd say that 'Great' instead of 'Grand' is less a typo and more just the wrong word altogether.  ;)

The previous use of the XC twitter account was purely as a marketing tool (similar to their facebook page) and was interesting to see months worth of tweets going unanswered. It's now covered by two shifts a day (I think one on Sundays) as a go between of the customer relations and control departments.

Autocorrect fail perhaps?

Ah, the power of the interweb and Twitter!

My mum, in her 80s, has been visiting recently. She used to drive, but no longer feels confident over the 210 mile distance between us. She came with my sister, but announced her intention to stay on, and go home by train. This was to be something of a proving trip for future visitations, so had to go well.

I bought her a ticket via FGW's website from BRI to BPN, leaving on XC, then changing at BHM to VT, and again at WGN to NT. With the help of Realtime Trains, I drew up a detailed itinerary,including seat reservations, station before destination, likely platform numbers, etc. On the first train, her reserved seat was in Coach J, so I guessed it was a double Voyager.

On the morning of departure, I watched Realtime trains with increasing alarm, as the train from Newquay heading to Dundee seemed to fail to register. The arrivals board at Par began to show it as late, the minutes count eventually reaching 86 late. Realtime trains, by this time, showed a new train from Plymouth at the same time as the doomed train was due to leave.

I needed information, so tweeted Cross Country. It was indeed a double Voyager, but one set had failed. They had uncoupled, and restarted the service with the surviving set from Plymouth. Mum's reserved seat on what was by now certain to be a crammed train was limping slowly through the Cornish countryside. XC's man on Twitter advised me to talk to staff at the station.

Cue FGW at Temple Meads, and some excellent customer service. The gate staff waved me through with mum, and directed me to the dispatcher on P5. I outlined the problem, he looked puzzled, because he was expecting a double Voyager. He radioed for information, and was initially told it was a double, but that was corrected within moments. "How did you know?" he asked me. I told him Realtime and Twitter, he remarked it was a fine state of affairs when the passengers know more about what is going on than the station staff. When the train arrived, he went to the train manager, then carried mum's luggage on board. The train was heaving as it pulled out, but mum was safe and sound in First Class. I tweeted both XC and FGW to thank them for their help.

You have to move with the times!