Car parking with Ringgo / APCOA Connect

[whole diary]

[Mookiemoo]

Gosh all this talk of parking charges. What good value some of the charges being quoted when Bath is ^10.10! Looking at the list on the FGW^▸ (First Great Western) website only Bristol TM^‡(resolve) is more expensive.

Paddington - 18 pounds for up to 12 hours, 22 pounds for a full day. APCOA^▸ (Car parking company used at GWR^▸ (Great Western Railway) - controlled stations in the area) but working for Network Rail rather than First, bearing in mind you can catch five different operator's trains at the station.

Five?

FGW
Connect
Express
Underground

What is the fith?

[Brucey]

Five?

FGW^▸ (First Great Western)
Connect
Express
Underground

What is the fith?

Chiltern - one per weekday

[Mookiemoo]

Five?

FGW^▸ (First Great Western)
Connect
Express
Underground

What is the fith?

Chiltern - one per weekday

Really?  Where to and when?

[eightf48544]

11:36 Pad High Wycombe.

There used to be an inbound service but I think it's now ECS^▸ (Empty Coaching Stock).

Three reasons.

It saves Daft having to issue a closure notice for West Ruslip to OOC^▸ (Old Oak Common (depot)) for passenger traffic.
It  gives Chiltern sort of grandfather rights to use Padd
It keeps Chiltern's drivers and guards' route knowledge up to date which they have used when they've run the Birmingham services into Pad.

I've caught it a couple of times in the past and there were more drivers than passengers.

[andynel]

Has anyone been to one of these "Meet the Manager" things before - http://theyellowlines.wordpress.com?  Just wondering if it's worth going to - or don't they take any notice anyway?

[johoare]

Well I paid for the first time today using apcoa connect. It worked absolutely fine.. Although I have noticed they do ask a lot more questions to get to the end result.. Which as it's a number which won't be covered by my phone contract isn't too good for me and others in the same boat.. Also they wait to the very end, with a long pause in between after you think you've paid.. to confirm your car registration.. I don't know what happens if you don't wait for that bit..

But anyway..I don't think the Apcoa man was at Shoppenhangers this morning.. He certainly wasn't in the smaller Silco drive car park.. The STILL need to advertise this soo much better.. You think they'd want to surely?

[eightf48544]

Probably. As it's Pad you might get Mark Hopwood MD FGW^▸ (First Great Western) as well as his team.

Parking is one of the few things under FGW control although day to day operation is with APOCA. Plus of course the intractable problem of the 166s' airconditioning, which they inherited from Thames and before them Network South East. One of Chris Green's few failures.

Things like the timetable, lack of stock and infrastructure failures are mostly out of FGW's control they have to be agreed with DaFT^» (Department for Transport - critical sounding abbreviation I discourage - about) and the ORR^» (Office of Rail and Road formerly Office of Rail Regulation - about) whilst with infrastructure they can  only chivvy Networkrail.

[ChrisB]

As a member of the Customer Panel, I'll be in attendance at PAD^» (Paddington (London) - next trains) tomorrow. It'll be interesting to see what proportion of comments will be about parking issues

[Chris from Nailsea]

The 'Meet the Manager' meeting at Paddington Station tomorrow is between 16.30 and 19.00 - posted here for those who hadn't yet picked up those details elsewhere. 

[JayMac]

Will anyone be there taking minutes for those of us who cannot attend?

[Timmer]

Will anyone be there taking minutes for those of us who cannot attend?

Priceless! 

[Bristol Traveler]

Do they ever do these meet the manager things elsewhere? Bristol for example?

[ChrisB]

Yes, they do.

There's a Meet the Manager webpage on the FGW^▸ (First Great Western) website that lists all the dates.

Unfortunately right now,. as they set the dates a year in advance, that year is about to expire & there's only the last two still listed.

I've asked whether the next set of dates can be posted up as there will undoubtedly be dates next month & people need advance notice....

AS for minutes - not really possible as each Manager is separately approachable & thus getting everyone's points together is near impossible. I am trying to get FGW to post up a summary of each session.....

[andynel]

Yellow Lines (from where you've taken your info) is 'sponsored' by who else but RingGo.....bear in mind they won't be impartial.

Surely, as long as it works, and it doesn't cost the commuter any more, how much else of the above is really any care of the commuter?
The case of thew 08451 number, rather than a geographical number like RingGo uses, is under discussion between the Customer Panel and FGW^▸ (First Great Western), and are hopeful of a successful conclusion. But possibly not before it starts on Monday as time to change it is very short.

Hi Chris
Have FGW now said that they're definitely removing the 08451 number? I've just checked my phone costs and it's costing me a minimum of 25p every time I call the new service (and that's including every time it doesn't work!). I don't like queuing for a ticket - but I'm sure not going to keep on paying by phone at that sort of cost.

[eightf48544]

Is the 25p in addition to the +20p they charged for you for the "Convenience of using the service". Which used to appear on the Taplow signs.

I'll have to check.