Hello NXEA,
For the past five working days I have had to deal with your professional handling of what no-one on the planet could have predicted: a bit of snow in winter. Because of 48 hours, now a week ago, where we had some snow come down, I have now had to deal with 5 straight working days of late running and cancelled trains. On none of those days was there any significant snowfall. “Adverse weather conditions” has been your slogan and excuse for pisspoor service leaving us, the pre-paying public, stranded and frustrated at your inability to guess that sometimes there is wintery weather during winter.
Oh but that’s not all. You sprung into action with your special timetable. In this case “special” meaning that you run fewer services, working on the basis that fewer trains can be run more reliably. Not one single one of your “special” trains that I was interested in ran on time. Not one single one. Indeed several didn’t run at all as they were affected by the “adverse weather conditions” mentioned above.
And then you feckless maniacs decide to add even more Christmas cheer. You decided at fuck all notice that the last train for my route (Liverpool Steet to Shenfield) shall be at 20.00 on the 24th. Excuse me? What? That’s something like 30 train journeys you’ve decided not to run: Just Like That. And that’s just on my route. What about workers who finish after 8pm?
Will you be issuing refunds for people affected by this unilateral withdrawal of service? Of course you won’t.
Just to add to the fun, you guys are going to be upping the cost of my ticket in January. I will be paying more money for a service that is barely adequate at the best of times, barely acceptable most of the time and non-existent all too often.
National Express East Anglia, you are incompetent fuckwits. You have no business being in charge of national infrastructure. There appears not to be one mild excess of weather you are capable of dealing with. Too much rain in spring, too much heat in summer, pesky leaves in autumn and cold days in winter. I have simply no idea how you plan to cope with the predicted number of people wanting to travel to Stratford for the 2012 Olympics. Fortunately, I plan to be elsewhere during that period.
Did I mention that you’re incompetent fuckwits?
Regards
Martin.
WAGN and One were just as bad before NXEA. FCC are exactly the same even now. Same problems, exactly the same excuses. Exactly the same shitty service.
Train-running companies: Fuck You All To Hell.
It might be worth adding ‘Network Rail’ to your hit list… ‘Adverse weather’ also means ‘ice’ and it’s their job to do the de-icing.
The plan for the Olympics—which appears to be working well so far—is to offer a service so useless that the locals go elsewhere for two weeks:
http://london-underground.blogspot.com/2010/11/olympics-chiefs-say-avoid-tube.html
While it might make you feel better, it doesn’t make a blind bit of difference to the TOC.
I would advise you write a letter to your MP instead. We had good results a couple of years ago with so many people complaining to our MP about London (Sh/M)idland’s lack of service, that questions were asked in the House and they very nearly lost their contract.
I gave up on trains a little while ago. Fortunately I work just within cycling range. I am now much fitter physically, and also mentally better off for not having to suffer the torture of trying to understand how something so simple can be made to fail so bad! I won’t go back to the trains unless they bring back the slam door carriages 🙂