THE CATHEDRALS EXPRESS 11/6 Paddington-Shrewsbury

Says it all............

 

Sidmouth, PM sent.

 

I would like to point out, the fact that an operator has made an unofficial statement via the moderators, shows a certain commitment that they do care about their customer's opinions sufficiently enough to make that statement...

They could have:

a. Stayed at home in bed and canceled the tour.. LOSE LOSE (everyone loses money/day trip etc)
b. Make every effort to make something good from an unexpected situation WIN WIN (Everyone gets a day trip with a steam locomotive)
c. Deploy 400 people with 400 horses to the four winds and make a japanese style groveling apology (Good PR but disproportionate and people will still moan anyway)
d. Do nothing and put a diesel on it, give everyone a small discount. (Win for the promoter, and everyone will still moan anyway).

From that I only see one option where everyones happy, maybe not ecstatic, but happy, and accommodate those who will never be happy elsewhere.

I'm sure there's been more phones ringing than comments on the forum, and their team has handled the situation, fed back to people here and more importantly they are running the trip best they can.

As a result of this there is a train on saturday... would you prefer there wasnt ?

 

Oakfield,as a past passenger on many SD trips I can only say that your idea that the trip should have been cancelled is daft.As steam enthusiasts we all have to accept that a large MAJORITY of the passengers are Mr & Mrs J Public who have booked a day out.Many of them are not particularly bothered exactly which locomotive is pulling the train or which bit of the trip is steam-hauled.If a small number of people like you(or me,if I was booked on it!)don't like it well we have to put up with it.That is how steam still runs on the main-line.It simply cannot make sense for SD to cancel a trip and upset a massive number of passengers so maybe the 10/20% of people who are bothered by this situation can have the their money back. Besides,someone has already commented earlier today that they have received a credit voucher so if you feel that you have been "defrauded" why have you not asked SD for the same?

I general,I have a lot of time for SD.In the past they have helped me personally with last minute amendments(for my own reasons) at charges less than advertised . Where things have gone badly wrong on a trip(through no fault of SD) they have rapidly offered substantial and generous discounts on future trips,something other railtour companies generally have not. Clearly its regrettable that you feel you have had poor service from them this time,however I do not think this is typical of them.

 

I would actually agree with the above comment,
It's a double edged sword,
(1) If promoters etc, would come on here, to give direct information from the horses mouth this would be a great thing and most members would accept this. This would also go a long way with customer relations.
(2) However, there is a minority on here, that are hell bent on cause problems, slagging off the promoters, even when they are not on that particular tour. Some members will just have a go and attack the promoters and tour operators as and when they see fit.
I want to go with the first paragraph, and I welcome informed discussion and debate. However the members who are part of the second paragraph, are not welcome here.

Cheers
Glyn Murray

 

Well you're the list owner, what are you going to do to stop them? Why not ban them from posting in particular parts of the forum? Hoping for some kind of self-regulation is sticking your head in the sand and hoping the problem goes away.

 

Self-regulation, I would think that a community like this should be able to attain, to a certain extent with certain members respecting others.
Sticking my head in the sand and hoping the problem goes away, that's not me, if what was my stance, I would not be posting within this thread, I would also not have a fantastic set of moderators, how on pretty much every day are apoligising or setting the record straight with other members of the heritage community, due to comments posted on here by a minority.
Yes I am the list owner, but I am not a dictator.

 

Anyone got any idea what the heritage diesel is on this tour?

 

Could'nt agree more. I find many of the moderators on here very thoughtful, informed with FACTS, and above all diplomatic......

 

UKSteam now has 6024 in charge, with 71000 taking over for the TE on Sunday.

 

That's idealistic and well-meaning but unlikely to happen.

 

If it's inappropriate and irrelevant then I wouldn't mind. Hoping for things to get better without doing anything about it isn't going to lead to improvements.

 

Exactly, I believe we are looking for some new moderators.. would you like to apply ?

 

I would be very interested.

 

Agree with you 100%. In my experience SD are a very decent organisation who deal with their customers fairly and are often the victims of circumstances beyond their control. As we know there are all sorts of unforseen difficulties on the railways (engineering works, pathing problems, locomotive failures etc...) none of which are the fault of a tour promoter and yet they do their best to try to provide something as close as possible to what is advertised and give us all a good day out. To start threatening legal action against them seems way over the top.

As regards this tour the alternative would have been to postpone to another date but they have already postponed 2 tours recently due to locomotive unavailability and presumably can't keep doing this. If I were booked on this one I would be happy with what is proposed - you still get steam for the interesting part of the trip after all.

 

In my view to accuse somebody of fraud is to accuse them of criminal activity and is a case for the boys in blue, not wasting money on solicitors. That's what some of our MP,s are in sing sing for...........