I saw there had been disruption during the day but the GWR▸ website was saying minor disruption and all trains on time. Got Paddington just before 5 and it looked like no trains running at all. Hard to tell as the display only had Heathrow Express services and some cancelled Maidenhead one. No staff around to ask of course, no station announcements and nothing on the board before I wandered up to H&C end to wait. There was a network rail person up there who I asked but he was 'security' and doing his checks. He did comment about the GWR staff and how they all disappear as soon as there's an incident.
I'm about truly staggered (each time - you think experience would teach me) how GWR fail to provide not just information but often wrong information. How can a company think it acceptable to withdraw all frontline staff every time there's an incident? This wasn't even a major one from the comments above. If you're worried about staff safety for a BAU incident then I think you seriously need to review your operating model.
Don't tell me my train is on time when it never was. I'm fortunate in that I can work flexibly. If there's problems I can work late, go to the pub, go for a meal and that's one less person at Paddington and I'm sure I'm not alone. Just give me information. Hottest day of they year and nothing. How about handing out bottles of water to the elderly and infirm? Or even not charging me to use the toilets when I've been stuck waiting for trains and/or information.
In the end I got on the first stopping (first service full stop) to Twyford which was truly horrible. People fighting to get on, other trying to get off because they're ill and one woman had a panic attack in the heat and crowds.
Barely seems worth mentioning being 25 mins late this morning.
Pretty much mirrors my experience yesterday (after also being 25 mins late in the morning) - I got back to Paddington around 1730, pretty chaotic, those few GWR staff that were around seemed too busy shouting at each other and those customers who did dare to talk to them rather than being helpful......no water on offer despite the temperatures and the delays having been ongoing pretty much all day.
Thought I'd got lucky when I saw that the 1711 to Henley was still waiting to depart (about 25 mins late), managed to cram on it - 3 car turbo despite the delays, hugely overcrowded, aircon? no chance. Crawled along to Ealing (they let a Hayes stopper out just in front) by which time you could have literally wrung out my shirt - temperature on the train was 40 degrees Celsius and there were a number of people who were obviously on the point of keeling over.
People were offering water/giving up seats for those finding it harder - apart from a couple of railway employees who studiously avoided the gazes of others - you would have thought they would be the first to jump up really.
So we get to Slough eventually "ladies and gentlemen this train will no longer stop at Burnham or Taplow due to an obstruction on the line" -hmmmmmm (no staff offering help at Slough either)
So a lot of us are turfed off to see that our next option is still over 20 minutes away and eventually turns up about 40 minutes late.
If this really was all caused by a pigeon it's quite a fitting symbol for GWR's resilience. Irrespective of who is ultimately to "blame" they own the Customer experience 100% and on this occasion, as on so many others, their response was pathetic.
Click on the map to explore geographics
