Great Western Coffee Shop

Over the last several days (at least) a large number of northbound mainline services (both FGW & XC) are initially being shown as up to 20 minutes late at EXD despite having left NTA on time. The posted delay then progressively reduces and/or vanishes altogether so that the train actually leaves EXD on schedule.
The listings for southbound trains are not affected in the same way.
Any of you resident experts know why this is happening?

It's been happening for a while and I think it is linked to this:

The CIS system between Taunton and Totnes has been useless of late as the "describers" were replaced by Network Rail (points that the train passes over so the systems know where they are), but something turned out to be incompatible with the FGW CIS system that Amey maintains, and so the system has been in 'time-only' mode for weeks, where unless delays are entered manually by stations or Swindon Control, everything shows on-time and the train will vanish off the screen automatically regardless of if the train has actually arrived or not.  Consequently the announcements "the train now approaching/exd this is exd, the train now standing" have not worked for weeks either.  There was an argument about who should pay to rectify the issue, NR, FGW or Amey, but this was resolved and last update I had was that this would be fixed on "Monday 7th"....

Clearly some of the Devon radio stations also have been given out duff info via Live Departures, as I was on my break yesterday and heard the train I was working was 20mins late, however, luckily I rang the signal panel as they told me it was on-time  :o

The TD feeds between Totnes and Tiverton Parkway have not worked for several weeks due to the reasons quoted. Our stations in the area are in 'Time Only' mode which puts all trains on time unless manually altered by the station (not all stations have the equipment to do this) or by us in Swindon Control. It is far from an ideal situation, and we have been frustrated by the length of time that our providers have given for the 'fix'. It is possible that we won't have these CIS screens working normally again until next month.
However, between us and the stations, we have maintained 98% accuracy in the area with train running information. The problem of this week have arisen with the National Rail Enquiries feed from the FGW system. There is a glitch in the software that is sending delays to NRE on odd trains leaving Newton Abbot that then replicate at both there, Exeter SD and Tiverton Parkway. NRE are very aware, and will tell you if you phone them not to rely on information on journey running on their site - we have asked again today for them to put a disclaimer on the site itself until the fault is fixed (hopefully by the end of the weekend). Local Radio stations were, until yesterday, using NRE for their travel information broadcasts - they have now been advised to use the FGW website which is reporting correctly.
We were only made aware of the extent of the problem yesterday, and are hoping for a speedy 'fix' by NRE!

In just a couple of posts we have seen what a fractured rail network has to deal with when there is a minor glitch.

FGW Swindon Control
National Rail Enquiries
Network Rail
Amey
and finally....the station staff involved.

Madness.

Yet another example of the engineer, who knows the interfaces, not being involved in the tender/specification process for the train describer equipment.

On another note, not convinced that Amey maintain FGW's CIS.

That might be why it isn't working then, because a bloke from Amey comes along and plays with it  ;D