Rules on suspended reservations?

[whole diary]

[Chris from Nailsea]

"Advantage Blakey" 

[JayMac]

"Advantage Blakey" 

Sat on the fence (cf net) rather than the umpire's chair there, Chris? Which (B)blakey? 

Or was the capital B an indication of your scoring of the point?

[Chris from Nailsea]

"Quiet, please." 

[inspector_blakey]

You will not be greatly surprised to learn that I believe your interpretation of the byelaw is incorrect;
<snip>
In very many years of rail travel this approach has only failed me once and the mere threat of Train Manager involvement resolved the situation very rapidly.     

You won't be greatly surprised to learn that I still think (know, actually) you're wrong then. Regardless of arguments about the definition of a "notice" in the byelaws, reservations are "officially suspended" when a TOC^▸ (Train Operating Company) fails to provide the labels. At this point the compensation arrangements that are in place for when seat reservations aren't provided apply: there are minimum compensation levels specified in the NRCoC^▸ (National Rail Conditions of Carriage), and many train companies offer more generous compensation arrangements in the Passenger's Charters should anyone holding a seat reservation have to stand as a result of said reservation not being honoured. As BMN has pointed out, your argument is with the TOC, not the passenger occupying the seat. Put yourself in their position: how would you feel if you ended up playing a game of musical chairs on a train with no seat reservation labels whilst a series of aggrieved and officious passengers brandishing reservation coupons shoved you around from one seat to the next?

In the situation you describe, the passenger was perfectly within their rights to stand their ground and stay put. No reservation label, no reservation. The fact that you managed to intimidate them into moving by threatening them with the train manager is immaterial: had you actually followed through on that threat then the train manager (assuming they know the rules, of course) would have told you exactly the same as I have above. And had it been me sitting there, I'd have told you ever so politely to jog on. I've done it before (although, I assume, not to you of course).

Umpire?

[JayMac]

New day, new Ump in the chair....

Deuce.

 

[Bob_Blakey]

...Put yourself in their position: how would you feel if you ended up playing a game of musical chairs on a train with no seat reservation labels whilst a series of aggrieved and officious passengers brandishing reservation coupons shoved you around from one seat to the next?...

I have no idea because the situation you describe has not arisen, and never will, because I do not travel on long distance train services without a seat reservation.

And I do not regard insisting on occupying four reserved seats around a table (yes, they used to exist!) when travelling with the wife and two young children as being officious.   

[inspector_blakey]

Fair enough. You opinion evidently differs from mine.

What is indisputable however, is that if one day you find yourself in the situation of trying to evict people from your "reserved" seats on a train with no reservations provided, and the person you're trying to kick out knows the rules and refuses to budge, you can threaten and jump up and down as much as you like but there's nothing you or the train staff will legitimately be able to do about it.

[smokey]

Bearing in mind all the above comments, how about this scenario!

Passenger J Bloggs arrives at Penzance station and boards the 09:40 PNZ-MAN train, finds seat C25 UNRESERVED, and settles down for journey to Manchester.

At 10:00 Mr G Bennett goes on line and buys a Ticket for the 15:31 BHM-SPT^▸ (Signal Post Telephone) train that day, he obtains a reserved seat.

At 15:30 Mr G Bennett finds Mr Bloggs in his Seat C25!

Who is in the wrong?

PS sorry haven't post since Feb 15th, had problems getting Steam Up on my PC, thats the last time I buy cheap coal.

[JayMac]

You raise an interesting point, smokey. CrossCountry have made great play in recent months with their facility to book a seat up to 10 mins before departure.

I'd argue that, if Joe Bloggs sits in a seat that is marked as 'available' at the time he boarded, then he should be entitled to occupy that seat for the duration of his journey. If Gordon Bennett comes along later with a seat reservation and the display has subsequently been updated, then Mr Bloggs should stay put and Mr Bennett should take up the issue with CrossCountry. Of course the display could say 'Available until X', but, with the facilty to book up to 10 minutes before departure somewhere en route, should Mr Bloggs have to crane his neck at every station to check whether he can continue to occupy his seat? What if he decides to have a kip?

Again, it's the rail industry at fault. CrossCountry may well trumpet their new fangled reservation option, but I think they've been somewhat blinded by their own (misguided) marketing versus what could happen on the ground.

Now, I know ticket price shouldn't be a guide as to whether you get a seat or not, but I'd be pretty miffed if I'd settled into my 'Available' seat at Penzance after paying for an Anytime fare to Manchester, only to discover some Johnny-come-lately (using XC^▸ (Cross Country Trains (franchise))'s silly 'up to 10 mins before' reservation) has legitimate claim to turf me out at Birmingham with his Off Peak to Stockport!

[IndustryInsider]

Doesn't the display on XC^▸ (Cross Country Trains (franchise)) services show the rather vague, but probably arse-covering 'This seat may be reserved' message on those few seats that can be booked after the train has started its journey?

[JayMac]

In all honesty, I was hypothesising and don't actually know what system XC^▸ (Cross Country Trains (franchise)) have in place for their '10 minute' reservation thingy.

Should really investigate before making such a hypothesis, (which, after investigation, would be a conclusion rather than conjecture) but I tend to avoid XC unless absolutely necessary. 

[readytostart]

The ten minute reservation system should now state "Reserved - this seat may be reserved en-route" if someone subsequently books that seat is will show "Reserved" between the stations of which it has been booked and then revert to may be reserved message. In theory the Train Management System should dial up every ten minutes or so and check for new reservations.
Train Managers are able to suspend ten minute reservations for parts of the journey (other than those that have already been booked) - handy when the screens in coach C aren't working - and also print off paper labels from their avantix machine, 3G signal permitting.
In other news the electronic reservation system on XC^▸ (Cross Country Trains (franchise)) HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train) should be online very shortly, although being bespoke like the catering galleys, when anything goes wrong it'll probably take forever to fix.