12/31/2023 0 Comments Snap on apparelShe makes herself available on the platform, explains the extent of delays (an almost daily feature these days), salts the slippery areas in winter and ensures the waiting room is clean and agreeably decorated. Maggie keeps an eye out for those who need help, such as the young woman with a learning disability who could not travel safely if Maggie did not coordinate with the guard. In small stations such as ours, the sale of tickets does not take up all the time. But such changes will benefit customers only if the central presence of the ticket-selling human being is preserved. After all, the danger of robbery in an almost cashless age must be making those secure windows increasingly redundant. It might indeed be no bad thing if some of the large spaces currently given up to ticket offices were converted into cafés (we already have a charming one in our station). The Rail Delivery Group wants more of what it calls “new retail partnerships”. Jackie Starr says: “Getting more staff out from behind the glass of ticket offices will ensure they are on hand to help sell tickets and give journey planning advice face to face.” But selling tickets and giving journey advice is exactly what ticket-office staff do now. She also understands the complexities of the station car park, which is vital for most commuters. The other day, she saved me £100 on the online price of a return ticket to Bristol. Maggie knows the intricacies of how these apply. She has an excellent, world-weary sense of humour and a resourcefulness about telling you how to get anywhere at a low price. If not, I buy from Maggie, the station mistress. If I am late or if there is a queue, I buy from the ticket machine. Two or three times a week, I walk to the station. It is not for me to decide whether I deserve anything at all, but here is my current “whole passenger experience”. Ms Starr burbles about “greater retail reform” so that customers “get the service they deserve” making “the whole passenger experience better”. And for the significant minority who use them, many of them elderly, the service makes an enormous difference. It is true that most people nowadays buy rail tickets online or from machines, but there must be literally no customers who positively want to get rid of ticket offices. She is quite right, but she should understand that what customers want is what they currently have – pleasant and well-informed human beings who sell them those tickets. This “should begin when you book your tickets”. Just now, she says, they want “the sense of relaxation and excitement that comes with a holiday”. Our village’s mainline station is one of them.Īccording to a recent blog on “Customer Focused Stations” by Jacqueline Starr, chief executive officer of the Rail Delivery Group, “we must be able to respond to what our customers want”. There are about a thousand railway stations whose ticket offices are now threatened with closure.
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