To most this will probably sound like a petty whinge and you'll probably say I should get over it. Perhaps your right but it won't alter the fact that I'm sick to death of how NXEC keep fucking about with the rolling stock they use for the 07.17 from Tinsel Town.

Firstly you can never be sure if a 225 or 125 will arrive. Secondly you can never be sure if the coach containing your reserved seat is actually there or not. If it is you can't be sure if it's the right way round or not. You can't even be sure if your stood on the correct platform until they tell you your not about 2 seconds before it arrives.

All in all you don't know what to expect these days which at 07.17 in the morning is a fucking right pain in the arse. No matter how tollerant you are, it's starts to get to you after a while and it's got to me.

There's an big, old fella who works at P'boro station who job it seems is to look after activities going on outside the main station building. I've seen this bloke at work on numberous occasions and his aproach to customer relations leaves a lot to be desired and his consistancy levels are non existant.

One day you might see him telling people they can't park in a certain place to drop people off, while the next he just stands there watching the same people comit the same crime. The next day you might see him telling customers they're not supposed/allowed to use the rear gate on platform 2 and the next he's stood watching as passengers open and exit via the same gate.

Whatever infringement it is that he decides to target that day, the one thing you can be sure of is that he will be very forceful and very rude. I watched and listened to him bollocking some poor bloke who had commited the heinous crime of cycling 50 yards the wrong way down the one way street directly outside the staition. Talk about going ott the geezer realy went for this poor bloke stating that not only was it against the law to cycle to wrong way down a one way street, it was also very dangerous for himself and other passengers. It ended in a 2 way threatening slagging match between him and the customer which neither won.

Personally, I'd support this guy if he was consistant in his action. But he's not. It seems to me that he's selective as to what he wants to tackle and when he want's to tackle it. I wouldn't be at all surprised if he was responsible for ticketing all the motorbikes a few weeks ago because he was always moaning about the bikes that used to park where we now know we're not supposed to park. The bloke is just a jobsworth who is incapable of dealing with customers in a proffesional manor. I spotted him this morning stood chatting to an asian fella outside the Great Northern Hotel while he watched car after car pull up on double yellow lines to drop passengers off. Of course he did nothing but carry on with his conversation.

"The King's Lynn and Peterborough lines into London have achieved their best ever performance levels in 11 years. The Great Northern (GN) route achieved a Public Performance Measure (PPM) of 96.54% for the period between 27 April and 24 May 2008. PPM is the percentage of passenger trains arriving on time or within 5 minutes at their destination."

My last meeting of the day over ran yesterday so I didn't get to Kings Cross until about 7ish. At least I got there, NXEC didn't. The departure board was showing all NXEC outbound services as delayed and there wasn't one NXEC train in the station. There were no announcments to explain what was going on, why there were no trains or when they expected any to arrive. There was also a distinct lack of staff to ask. No doubt they had no information and chose to keep their heads down in the staff room.

Thankfully there were a couple of FCC trains sitting at the platforms and I noticed one was going to Peterborough. As it was only stopping at St Neots and Huntingdon, I opted to jump on and I'm glad I did because FCC got me home without a hitch.

I'm gutted. The KX redevelopement is finally having an impact because the Cornish Pastie & Costa coffee booths have gone. I presume they've been removed for the foreseable future but if anyone know if they've been moved or where, please let us know because I prefer a large traditional pasty to a fat fuled burger.

I thought I'd pop in and say hello. I've not written for a while, well, not since I moved down to the Big Smoke.

Fentyke - how the bloody hell are you?

On a call, so I must dash. I will pop back and catch up with all the ramblings and post a more informative message.

Take care.

Last Friday, Peterborough police were searching passengers for Drugs and knives at Peterborough Station. On site were aproximately 8 coppers, 2 sniffer dogs and 2 knife/metal detetcting gates sited just inside the main doors. They say they checked 160 people and found..... wait for it..... Zero knives. In the 6 hours they were there, they did however arrest 4 people for minor drug offences and catch a number of fare dodgers.

Guess what? They have declared the exercise a success. What bollocks. At best this was the right strategy in the wrong place at the wrong time. I certainly don't class 4 minor drug offences a good days work for 8 coppers or efficient use of such resources. I also question their claim that 160 people were checked because everyone I saw entering and leaving the platform via that main door was checked by both the metal detector and the sniffer dog. And I was only there for a few minutes as I stood in the que wondering what the hold up was for. What I think they meant was that the machine beeped or the dogged wagged for 160 people and all these people were thoroughly searched.

As far as I'm concered, 100's of people were inconvenienced, delayed and made to feel like a they were under suspicion of something they hadn't done. On top of that, it was more than possible to avoid being checked because the cafe doors were unmanned. Any crim with half a brain would simply exit or enter the platform from here if they wanted to avoid an unexpected search.

So commuters. We're not just moaning old cunts with too much money, Peterborough police also think some of us a re knife weilding, drug taking crims who deserve to be banged up.

http://www.peterboroughtoday.co.uk/news/Police-hail-39success39-of-railway.4354234.jp

If ever there was proof the RP treat some people differently to others, this is it.

I've got some relatives over from Australia staying at my mothers. They arrived on Monday afternoon and bought a train ticket at the airport to take them from Heathrow to Peterborugh. They arrived at Kings Cross in time for the 17.30, found 4 unreserved seats in coach G and sat down for the final hour of a mammoth 24 hour journey. Little did either of us realise that we were both on the same train. Them in Coach G and me in coach E.

Anyway, shortly after departure the RP guard, ticket inspector, call him what you will, started to do his rounds. He eventually got to my relatives, took one look at their ticket and told them the tickets weren't valid for that service and they would have to pay the excess. He then proceeded to get his book out and tell my exhausted reli how much it was going to be for 4 adults. At this point our Jim hit the roof. Being a plain talking Aussi he told the guard exactly what he asked for at Heathrow and exactly what he could do with his excess charge. On hearing his tale, the guard had second thoughts, took pity and waivered the charge.

On the one hand I'm quite pleased that the guard handled the situation in this way. He clearly lost out on a few quids worth of commission and he saved my relatives a good amount of money to boot. On the other hand, he should have charged them exactly the same as he would have done to a British National. Having said that, I personally think he did the right thing by letting them off and for that he has my thanks.

Onboard ticket checks.

I overheard one of the guards this morning, telling a fellow commuter that NXEC are trying to move onboard Revenue Protetion (Guards to you and I) to ticket barrier duty and cease ticket checks on board altogether. Could this be goodbye to Sean (who I now see on some early evening services) Matt and the other guards who I happen to think are good at their jobs.

Between St Neots and Stevenage? For past few weeks it seems to me that trains are slowing, often to a crawl, between St Neots and Stevenage and it doesn't matter what time of day you travel either. I've travelled at all times of day in the past 3 weeks and we always seems to slow right down in sort of the Biggleswade area. Even the 23.30 last last night slowed right down. I haven;t seen any signs of engineering work but that doesn;t mean there isn't any. But if this is, surely 3 weeks is enought to complete most things.

What is it NXEC have against the 07.17? In order or regularity, on any one day you can be sure that one or more of the following will affect this service: -

1. Its a 125 set one day, a 225 for the next 2 and then back to a 125 for the next 2. Either way we never know what type of train is going to arrive and are consequently unsure where to stand on the platform or where seat reservations are. In addition and as mentioned in earlier posts, the unrefurbed 125 coaches are a fucking disgrace. £5500 to sit on a 30 year old seat that's had every substance known to man spilt on it at some point in it's life. Fuck of NXEC. You should be paying us to sit in that squalor and your staff should be on double time to work in it.

2. No seat reservations. OK this affects nearly every service but it's still bloody frustrating.

3. It's late. Goes without saying really and I think you can guess how frustrating this problem is.

4. There's a coach missing (Usually C or D) which again means we have no idea where our seat reservations have been moved too. At least we haven't until we're pulling out of the station and they finally get round to telling us at the end of the welcome aboard crap. Why they can't tell us while we're stood on the platform is beyond me.

5. It arrives well early. Not such a problem at all and no complaints from me if it arrives early. I especially love to watch the people who panic and leg it thiniing that they'd better run because if it arrives early, it will leave early. Eh, no it won't it will leave at 07.17 so stop panicing, stop running and stressing etc and take your time.

6. Either the train is back to front or one or more of the coaches are. Staff must get a bit of a laugh watching passengers sqeeze past each other through the aisle as they traverse the opposite end of the coach were their seat no resides. I do.

7. It often arrives early into Kings Cross even if it arrived into Peterborough late. Again, no complaints from me for arriving early however it does highlight just how much time NXEC have built into the time table to help them meet targets.

All in all there is no consistancy with this service at all. Don't get me wrong it's not THAT bad a service as it is usually on time at both ends. However, as a commuter we never know what to expect which many find frustrating. Not me mind as I've got to the point where I find most of the so called 'problems' minor and it sometimes makes me chuckle listening and watching other passengers moan like buggary. I've also invented a little game to brighten up the morning where you have to guess what will be wrong with it each day. You get 1 point for everything you guess right and lose half a point for everything you got wrong. At the end of the week you tot up the score and see who'se won. Seeing as I'm the only one playing, I win most weeks.

I'm sick to death of how NXEC fail to comunicate with us passengers. Like thousands of other people I was heavily delayed last Thursday thanks to the Power line coming down between Stevenage and KX. Accepted, from NXEC's point of view they couldn't do anything about it other than wait for the lines to be fixed and look after their passengers. Sadly but not unusually, they failed miserably on the latter.

I would go as far to say that the information NXEC gave out last Thursday and on previous occasions when the lines are down, is worse than the info GNER used to release in similar circumstances. What you get when the TOC's fail to regularly update customers are thousands of commuters running round trying to work out what to do next. Honestly it's farcical. I've got to the point where I don't try and second guess to get home at a reasonable time. Oh no. These days I just run to a nice pub across the road and don't return to KX until gone 9pm by which time, things are a lot quieter and the lines are usually back up.

Here's another example of how poor NXEC's communication is. Whenever they fail to put the seat reservations out or when the 'LOOSE' a coach, NXEC know the minute it leaves to starting station that there is a problem with that service. Perhaps NXEC do call or send an email to every station that service is due to stop at between the starting point and the end destination to tell them what the problem is. But do they tell us while we're stood on the platform waiting for the damn thing? Nope. Twice this week the 07.17 has arrived with coach C missing, once with coach D missing and once with no seat reservations. 3 times passenegers have boarded not knowing where the hell their seat is and 3 times we have boarded into chaos. All it would take to avoid this situation is a short 'We are sorry to announce there will be no coach C on the 07.17 to KX. Passengers with seat reservations for coach C will find them in coach D', etc, etc. Clearly this is far to much trouble and clearly NXEC think this is far too much information for our tiny brains to cope with at 07.15am.

In the 8 months since NXEC took control of the ECML, I have to say service has gone down hill. Delays are up, customer satisfaction is down, prices are up above inflation, season ticket benefits are non existant. This is back up by the result of the recent Passenger focus customer satisfaction survey which you can find here http://www.passengerfocus.org.uk/news-and-publications/press-release.asp?dsid=1761. Of the 30 catagories, customers are happier in 3 of them, feel 4 are no better or worse than last year meaning NXEC are worse in 23. I could go on but I think you get the picture.

And no, before anyone gets clever, it hasn't expired. Just got wasted by the KX barriers, at a guess.

I'm kinda tight for time this week, and I generally have NO time at P'boro station on a morning OR evening. So, being vaguely smart, I thought I'd get it replaced at KX ticket office.

Guess what?

You can't. Because it was issued at P'boro it has to be replaced at P'boro.

Meh.

Or refurb the rolling stock you used on this mornings 07.17. I've sat in some, old filthy, smelly coaches but non quite as bad as coach C on this mornings 07.17. What an embarassment. Torn seats and carpet that looked like they'd been washed like last summers floods. Honestly, if I was invited into somebodies house and they offered me a seat on a sofa which was half as bad as the seat NXEC wanted me to sit in this morning, I'd politely refuse and insist on standing.

In fact wihile I'm ranting about rolling stock I'd also like to ask for a little consistancey. Some days the 07.17 is an old 125, others a 225, but hardly ever the same 2 days running. Due to the differences between the different coachs, your never quite sure where your reserved seat is, or where to stand on the platform for the door. A minor gripe compared to the first but worth a mention.

Against the odds I decided to give NXEC a call to see if they would be willing to cancel my parking ticket. Unbelievably they did but not without telling me that there is and always has been adequate signage in that area (wrong and Keith can prove it) that I had broken the rules (news to me) and that I shouldn't do it again (now I know what the rules are and there are signs to tell me, I won't). It crossed my mind to put him right but I decided against it because clearly he doesn't know the truth, is only repeating what he's been told and most of all, he doesn't give a shit.

It seemed to me that matey boy on the other end of the phone has recently had this conversation more than once. He was very condesending, but to his credit, he was at least polite (as was I). What stikes me was he would tell me why NXEC had opted to cancel these tickets or explain why NXEC had waited for me to contact them for me to learn that the ticket had been cancelled.

NXEC have really fucked up with this issue over where to park Motorcycles. I've recently learnt that the main reason NXEC wanted to move the motorcycle parking away from the area that was ticketed was because they received a very small number of complaints (perhaps as many as 2) from people who park their cars in the north car park. I seems that a very small number of motorcyclists were riding at high speed down the footpath to exit the station from the north car park. Quite rightly NXEC felt this was unsafe. They also pointed out that most people who parked in this area also had to ride on the very wide footpath to aceess the area which they also felt was unsafe.

However, since the ticketing fiasco most people now seem to be parking their bikes in designated area in the south car park. To access this area we now have to cross a very small and restricted part of the footpath which people who parked their car in the sth car park are using continuously. It seems to me that crossing this small footpath on a motorbike is considerably more dangerous to pedestrians that it was when we were using the large wide footpath by the north gate.

In addition to the dangers posed to pedestrians, it's clear that there isn't enough space to acomodate all the motorcyles anymore. Consequently many people are being forced to park their bikes just outside the designated motorcycle parking area and I'll lay odds that NXEC will start ticketing these people in the not too distant future. I'll also lay odds that NXEC will start to charge for motorcycle parking just as soon as they think they can get away with it.

Fuck em.

I've been chatting with a number of other commuters who also picked up a parking ticket last week and learnt a whole lot more.

1. At least 1 person has already had their ticket revoked by station staff yet the same people have told most this wasn;t possible.
2. Most people intend to pay the ticket and appeal.
3. A few have got hold of NXEC directors home addresses via the Companies House Website and will be writing directly to them.
4. Most beleive propper, lawful signage and notices were erected Friday Lunchtime.
5. Not one NXEC employee will admit that they weren't there on Thursday morning when we all parked yet each and every one knows they weren't.
6. At least 5 other people are considering switching to FCC as a direct result of NXEC's actions. Thats £27500 worth of lost revenue
7. One person is going to send payment in pennies, another intends to write out 60 cheques of 50p and another intends to travel up to York to pay in person and give them a piece of his mind.
8. Everybody I spoke to is insensed at the way NXEC have handled this. All said they would have been happy to stop parking in that area had NXEC asked us not too.
9. All feel the places we're now parking are too small and woefully inadequate. This was proven this morning when the parking area to the south of the station was full by 06.55 despite being helf flooded. I myself had to park in and inch of water and thanked my lucky stars I wore boots and not shoes or trainers.

All in all, everybody seems to be agreived about the same things but all intend to deal with it slightly diferently. Personally I like the idea of writing to ALL the Directors and paying in multiple cheques but I'm out of the office most of today so can't get to the companies house website until this evening. If anybody else can, please post their details here and I'll put them on a full post later.

I fucking hate NXEC today. So much so that I am now seriously considering showing how anoyed I am by doing the only thing NXEC might, just might, pay attention too and that's switch to FCC.

After nearly 4 years of parking my scooter in the same place, I got back this evening to find I've incurred a Parking fine of £30 if paid within 14 days or £60 if not. Why have I got a parking fine? I'm not sure and from the useless conversations with the many equally useless NXEC employees I've spoken to today, neither do they.

Very near to where I park, there are 2 signs clearly stating that parking is prohibited in that area. What's not clear is exactly what area is covered by these signs so being the good honest person that I am, I never park anywhere near the signs. What's also not clear is what will happen if you do park there. It doesn't tell you if they will clamp or issue a fine. I know the answer now alright.

There are a number of issues that have insensed me today. Firstly, NXEC have without warning enforced a parking restriction in an area that to my knowledge, has never been enforced before. Secondly they have done this without warning. Thirdly, There is no warning what the penalties are or if indeed there is a penalty and i'm not sure if it legal to do that. Also, it's obvious to one and all that the people parking there are commuters who spend far more money with them than 90% of their other customers. Therefore they done this to their most valuable customers, again without warning. Next comes the many useless cunts I've had the mispleasure of speaking to today who quite frankly and quite obviously couldn't give a toss about customers and service. First there was the useless tosser in the ticket office, then there was the useless prick on the platform, then there was the useless twat in customer services, then there was the useless knobhead on the switchboard at head office and i'm sure there would have been a useless cunt at NXEC debt recovery had they bothered to pick up the phone.

As there were roughly 30 bikes parked there today, all of them regulars, that's £900 minimum they've raked in. I urge each an everyone of you who read this blog to ring or write to David Franks, Managing Director of NXEC. He can be contacted on 08457 225 333 or write to David Franks, Head Office, National Express East Coast, Station Road, York, YO1 6HT. Don't forget to mark it private and confidential so it stands a better chance of him actually reading it.

All in all a very, very bad and sour experience.

NXEC - Stick it up your fat arses your complete and utter bastards.

I've got to say sorry for the lack of posts lately. Work and family have taken over of late so i've had no time to dedicate to the blog. Hopefuly things should be getting back to normal soon so I should be posting a bit more regularly.

One thing I will say concerns the 07.20 which has nnow become the 07.17. Whilst I knew NXEC were issuing a new timetable, neither GNER nor NXEC had ever changed the times of the morning commuter services so i wasn;t expecting to have to rush when I arrived at the station yesterday morning. But rush I did, straight over to platform 3.

This change hasn;t gone down well with the regulars either. Like me they're not too keen on the train arriving 3 mins earlier (and so far it has) they don't like having to walk over to platform 3 where there is no shelter from the elements and they don;t like the fact that it's scheduled to arrive at 08.11 which is exactly the same time as it did when it was the 07.20. Personally I could give a monkeys. All I'm saying is that many passengers haven't greeted this change with open arms.

Passengers to meet rail managers
Rail passengers in Norfolk and Cambridgeshire will have the chance to praise services or vent frustrations.

National Express East Anglia is holding "meet the managers" sessions at Norwich station later with another at Cambridge station on Wednesday.

The company said it hoped to learn from passengers' experiences and would use the information to improve services.

A spokesman said more sessions had been planned at local stations including Diss, Braintree, Ipswich and Witham.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------

Personally, I think NXEC would benefit from a similar exercise in Peterborough.

- Does anyone know why the 0610 slows down to a crawl at pretty much the same point every morning (about 0635)?

- Is it just me, or has the on-train WiFi been a tad flaky of late? The 0610's WiFi seems to come and go once every 5 mins, and several of the later afternoon trains never give me a working IP.

http://www.nationalexpresseastcoast.com/Travel-Information/ - yes, despite not saying so until you look at one online, these are the NEW timetable.

0720 folks please note it's going to become the 0717.

I'm considering changing phones and provider for my mobile. One thing that I do find annoying about my present provider (T-Mobile) is the poor coverage on parts of the ECML. Apart from the inevitable drops in the tunnels, it's also VERY patchy just north of Stevanage and from St. Ives to Peterborough.

So, gentle readers with other companies: what are the other providers like? (particularly interested in O2).

A wee frisson of nostalgia just now as the guard on the 0700 announces 'Standard class customers are requested to exit through standard class. There is no access through the catering car...."

What... exactly... does 'on time' mean?

According to my dictionary:
"punctual |ˈpə ng k ch oōəl|
adjective happening or doing something at the agreed or proper time; on time : he's the sort of man who's always punctual."

Now, clearly, that's not exactly what NXEC mean. What NXEC say is: "Punctuality is measured as a percentage of all National Express East Coast trains that have arrived at their final destination within ten minutes of the advertised time: this is known as the Public Performance Measure (PPM)."

But, of course, the 'advertised' time, as anyone can tell from a quick peek at the Kings Cross arrivals board is anything from 2 to 6 minutes later than when NXEC think the train'll actually get there.

Anyone want to tell me how much slack there is on top of that in the working timetable? I've been told that pre-Hatfield the actual no-slack time was around 34 mins from Peterborough to King's Cross.

Of course, in order to meet performance goals, NXEC only have to meet the PPM nine times out of ten.

So. Anyway. On time? Means "no more than 15 mins later than we think we can do it, PLUS we can balls it up totally about five times a day."

My season ticket renewal last week, needless to say, didn't get a discount. At least I don't think it did, since I can't actually find out on the NXEC web site how much I should have paid.

Of course, that was the grandfathered GNER-style compensation clause. From now on, I can claim for individual delays.... and look, we have another brand spanking new definition of 'on time'.

THIRTY minutes later than the already generous timetable. And I get paid in lovely, shiny, NXEC vouchers. At least I can use 'em to pay for next year's season ticket, but... hey, look. Now we can balls up EVERY train EVERY day by 29 minutes (plus our generous slack built in to the timetable) and not have to compensate the customers.

I hope everyone of our regular readers will be tuning into BBC 1 to cheer on the mighty Barnsley and see us do to the not so mighty Cardiff City what we did to liverpool and Chelsea and them out of the FA cup and send them back to Wales.

Sadly I won't be tuning in but I will be watching from my seat at Wembley. (so all you train staff working Sunday Lunchtime will ave the pleasure of my company for 1 extra day this week).

Youuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu Reeeeeedsssssssssssss

What happened to the 07.20 this morning is anybodies guess. Platform staff didn't know what was happening, commuters ddin't know and neither did on board staff.

Looking at the departure board in the main building, there was no sign of the 07.20 but there was mention of a service we've never seen before which was the 07.24. I heard a few people asking station staff what was going on but some didn't know whilst others just said that the 07.20 had been retimetabled to 07.24, it was just for today but they didn't know why.

With an extra 5 mins to play with I opted to fill the time by getting a cuppa. I'd just got served when I looked round to see the train arriving on platform 2. I looked at the clock and it said 07.19 so I grabbed some sugar and legged it. We then sat there for a full 4 mins until 07.24 when the doors closed and we pulled out. A few mins later the tannoy beeped and the lady CSM gives us the usual buffet car open, trolly in standard class type announcment then says the train is scheduled to arrive at 08.10 (it didn't) which is 2 mins earlier than the 07.20 is due to arrive when it's running on time. Needless to say it didn't arrive at 07.10, 07.12 or even 07.15. In fact we arrived at 07.20.

Clearly NXEC HO still have serious problems communicating with customer facing staff. The thing is if they can't communicate changes and/or the reasons behind them to staff, what chance have customers got of obtaining up to date and accurate information? This morning was just laughable and I suspect that some cummuters opted to jump on the 07.14 FCC instead of waiting the extra 5 mins for the 07.20 (which is fine by me as the 07.20 is a lot quieter).

And before anyone acuses me of moaning, I'm not. I'm just telling the tale.