Great Western Coffee Shop

From Edinburgh Live (https://www.edinburghlive.co.uk/news/edinburgh-news/raging-edinburgh-train-passenger-says-25212553)

It was my understanding that if you had not taken your booked seat after departure from your starting point it was no longer booked. Am I correct? If so what was LNER doing? Was the bouncer breaking the law?

Should have just sat in the seats, the bouncer cannot touch you as that is assault.  If BTP were summoned at the next stop the Police Officer could well use their discretion and not intervene as it being unreasonable for the seats to remain empty and being left empty could lead to public disorder.

Try getting past a bouncer blocking the vestibule door. They couldn’t touch him eithdr, for the same reasons (assault)

Also the ‘VIP’may have paid for all those seats to remain empty. Did she have seats reserved in the same coach? Somehow, it sounds as though she didn’t. LNER should have made some arrangement to show the coach was reserved throughout if it was.

If it wasn’t, the train manager should have been approached to resolve

What do the Conditions of Carriage say about empty reserved seats

You are able to book a whole coach out, rather than reserve all the seats.

And according to the article, that was done.  What your are able to do and SHOULD be able to do may be different matters, for discussion ... and what happens (as I understand here) when a previous train is cancelled and you're trying to fit more passengers that conmofortable into the remaining space on the train with the reserved coach is an interesting call

Probably not if you are the person that has paid all that money in order to reserve your whole coach. A contract is a contract.

Perhaps we need compulsory sear reservations like on continental HS services? That should focus minds on whether we need additional capacity too!

Hmm ... I'm not thrilled with that idea, bearing in mind that so many shorter distance journeys are made on long distance trains, and return legs of day return trips are often made on completion of business, so which train you catch is unpredictable.   But mostly-reserved with a small proportion of not-reservable may be OK?

The train in the reported issue was really busy because a previous train had been cancelled.   What would you do for booked passengers on a cancelled train on an all-reserved system?  I recall having that issue with BA many years ago, and being told that the next available flight with spaces was 10 days away.  I was travelling with 2 children (10 and 5 at the time) and the three of us did not like the BA offer and worked around it in an alternative way; thank you, BA, for helping me learn to stand up for myself and get effective resolve.  ;)

 

Already happening on Avanti WC….try booking a ticket from BHM to PRE on November 3 !! I’ve had to book via MAN at a slightly increased/longer journey as ‘tickets sold out’ on all daytime trains

Any indication who the person was?

If it was one of the Royal Family etc, it could make more sense

I’m not sure the security guy for them would be described as a bouncer’?

They wouldn't be using LNER's standard "Private Hire" offer (https://www.lner.co.uk/tickets-savings/your-ticket/private-hire/), would they?

https://www.lner.co.uk/tickets-savings/your-ticket/platinum-service/
I've no idea how long this has been available or whether other operators have something similar, but unless it's very new I'm surprised we haven't heard similar angry tweets before. But probably there have been, just this one happened to be noticed by Edinburgh Live.

It seems a fair enough description. He was "bouncing" people at the carriage door. It's not clear though whether he was hired directly by the group using Platinum Service or was LNER's "private host". I expect the former but maybe not.

Another consideration is whether this was an end carriage, so only occupying that one coach, or a middle one, so preventing progress along the gangway.

I meant in terms of acting for a Royal Family member, as had been suggested. Which makes me doubt that it was....

Stated in the article to be coach B. While the quotes are not clear, and the text does not help a lot, my reading is that access through the coach had to be allowed. So a lot of people had to be told not to sit there - in a way that inevitably was felt to be aggressive.

If GWR offer a similar service, how about hiring a whole carriage on the TransWilts for the next Coffee Shop meeting?

<ducks and runs>

Many a true word spoken in jest ... I could tell tales of getting services strengthened for Santa in 153 days, and of some interesting tales of reserved carriages and trains packed throughout.   

I suppose we could still reserve a coach on the 05:17 off Westbury.  Other than that, occupants per carriage on the TransWilts is often higher than occupants per carriage on the main lines from either end to London. How does that timing suite members?

Or go even better - charter a whole train. GWR are still willing to do this

Errr ... if that were off the main lines, does that mean they would willingly shorten something such as a Cardiff - Portsmouth in order to run you a special, or do they have special "special only" trains hidden somewhere?   What about paths (I appreciate that on some routes such as Bristol - Salisbury they could run in the timings of the axed Waterloo service)?

Spare capacity generally….and paths always exist (except in the weekday peaks close to London). Harder for spare ctrains in the peaks of course. But off-peak &!weekends aren’t problematical generally

This would be the special reserve hidden under Box tunnel!