What should a tour operator do when the routing or the locomotive has to change ?

Title says it all.

If a tour operator stumbles on a situation where their is a significant routing / destination change, or the requested locomotive is unavailable, what do people prefer the tour operator to do ?

I'm refering here to more "routine" railtours / locomotives (i.e. not one offs, unique trips or "first time" since 196x) tours.
Examples include: Line Closures, Paths unavailable, Weather, Failures etc.

This is a generic preference.

Please dont make this an opinion expressed about any one specific tour.
Also keep it free from Compensation, Money Back etc... it's merely about preference.

For clarification:

Cancel the tour (They should never change) - maybe run a new tour at a later date but as a new or different tour.
Change the date (Keep the route or locomotive) - Keep the tour, just find another date.
Change the Locomotive / Route to another suitable / related - locomotive or destination - keep the date if there's somewhere appropriate or an available steam locomotive.
Change the Locomotive / Route to anything available (ie non/any-steam / no related destination) - if there is nothing suitable, then run the tour to "somewhere" else or with "something" but do not cancel or change the date.

 

Any of the above could be appropriate, what is necessary in this age of instant communication ( the vast majority of tour passengers have e-mail addresses) is to keep the passengers up to date and not let them find out second- hand, by which time antagonism may well have already started and to ensure that their front of house staff have reliable, up to date information.

In my view that is all that is required.

 

I haven't voted in the poll because I don't this there's a single answer. It all depends on the circumstances and what alternatives are available. I'm sure every tour promoter and operator will try to finf for the best alternatives when what was originally planned is not available. It's easy to sit in front of a computer monitor and say that they should have done this and that, but we don't usually know the full picture with regard to alternative pathings, loco and crew availability etc. With regard to Oakfield's comments, yes, I agree that the promoter should keep the passenger informed, but we have to give them time to get all of the alternative arrangements in place before informing passengers. It would be even worse if then send out an e-mail one day, saying sorry, loco A is not available, we'll be using loco B, following by another e-mail the next day saying sorry, B is out of gauge for the route, we'll try loco C, then sorry a support crew can't be found for C, so we'll use D etc.

 

I agree and thanks for the reply, though I wasnt asking for pontification (it wouldnt be right)..

I was seeking peoples preferences...all votes are in confidence (even I cant see who voted where).

Seems the predominance are that if change happens it needs to and people dont mind, but also note that communication (in advance) is the thing..

so in the case of something short notice (or even if it's only a risk of it happening) would people be happy with a communication that was very vague ? - say something like "in a few weeks this may happen, if so then there may be a plan B, but if it doesnt we'll stick to plan A" - wouldnt that be rather confusing ?.. and what happens if Plan B falls apart, should they then send a Plan C email ?, and again what if they revert to plan A anyway ?

I think personally I wouldnt mind knowing in advance if there is a "risk" of something happening but little details (no news is good news), but when it's short notice or a confirmed change.. i'd rather wait for the full facts of a plan B - conjecture causes sometimes unfounded concern....

 

Surely there's never going to be a 'hard & fast' rule - too many variables at play here, I suggest

 

From a personal view, if there had to be changes, I would want the train to run with some steam to any destination.

Where I live it invariably means an overnight stay before and after the tour, especially if my wife is with me. This means hotel bookings, which I try and book early to get the best rates. If the tour was cancelled then I would have wasted money on the hotel bookings. If the locomotive was changed to a diesel for the complete tour then i would prefer not to travel and waste my hotel bookings (Western Champion excepted). I would guess that most tour customers travel to the train on the day and their preferences may be different.

And herein lies the problem for tour operators in laying out hard and fast rules, as every customers’ situation and preferences are different.

 

We should remember that a cancelled tour could ruin the organiser - as long as the organisers are doing their best, we should be reasonable about things not going totally to plan.

 

A quick and dirty answer is that Network Rail should not agree to itineraries that they later withdraw except, in cases of force majeure. From the outset, once a route is signed for for a particular class of engine, on a particular date, to an outline set of timings, then all parties should be 100% sure that it can happen.

The problem is that this basic set of legal and contractual rules that would underpin any other consumer product is simply missing from the railtour business. Any cancellations stemming from a failure to observe these simple principles falls foul of the Sale of Goods Acts, and the Unfair Contracts Acts, as the reasonable level of skills due from Network Rail who accept and validate the proposal is not present in acceptance of the TOC proposal as things presentlystand

Equally there needs to be realism from promoters and TOCs that their own proposals are deliverable and realistic from the outset. Locos should not be advertised as contracted for when they aren't even in ticket - when a pool "choice" that could turn up and haul should be substituted. Plainly unrealistic schedules should never be requested - they simply muddy the waters and bring the whole setup into disrepute etc. Cancellations and delays arising from errors in planning should be compensated as they are avoidable long before a tour goes on sale.

However, at the end of the day there are the fifty ninth minute of the eleventh hour alterations that exclusion clauses are meant to cover and that no-one can validly complain about, FTR refusals, loco failures, line closures for unavoidable engineering reasons etc, fire risk, snow, etc, which leave no time for alternative plans. Then of course there are failures on the road.

Some of these should surely be insurable risks thus protecting the promoter etc from direct exposure to costs, albeit that at the end of the day there must also be an element of uncoverable and uninsurable risks.

These latter risks are what exclusion clauses actually cover, and accordingly it is impossible to simply tick a box in a poll to give an answer to a fluid set of circumstances just to make up a meaningless statistic.

Railtouring is a multimillion pound business - not playtime.

 

I fully agree that it is becoming increasingly difficult for promoters to advertise a particular loco for a trip. I think from the outset there should be more of a 'pool' policy for tours, i.e if 'X' isn't available we intend to use 'y' or even 'z'. This isn't being awkward or dishonest but is being straight from the start. There are pools of locos around country e.g Crewe, Carnforth, Southall, Bristol. If someone is booking for a particular loco then they should be made fully aware that 'y' or 'z' will be used in event of unavailability of 'X' and be aware of this when booking. An exception maybe significant anniversary, first visit to Shap / devon banks etc, then rearrangement of date should happen. A pool loco policy should always be the case when advertising an under overhaul loco which hasn't even run yet, though I think there is a big question mark over whether promoters should even be advertising these. If a loco still has it's boiler off when being booked for a tour no promoter could be even vaguely confident of it's availability (unless it's a Riley Black 5!). As for route then I fully expect to reach the destination that I booked for, minor adjustments as to how I get there are acceptable but not as acceptable if the whole point of the tour was to go via somewhere unusual, e.g book to go Central Wales to Newport but end up going via Hereford and Abergavenny. The promoter should also be realistic when promoting tours, don't promote a route that can only be done with only one loco or circumstances for instance, especially when said loco may not even be available to them on the date or when the route isn't yet available (e.g new connections to heritage lines). Lastly, if there are significant changes to a tour (such as substantial loss of mileage, new destination, not visiting important route etc) then a no quibble transfer to another tour or partial refund if you choose to travel should ALWAYS be offered. At the end of the day it is down to personal preference what is an acceptable change or not - there are 101 reasons why people book on a tour. I think as enthusiasts we fully understand that there are many difficulties facing tour operators, how promoters handle them and treat customers makes the difference as to whether we choose to travel with them and clearly some are better than others. Joe Public isn't as understanding but probably far more interested in meal, destination and quality of service than route, loco or steam miles. What we both want though is a fair, good quality AND most importantly HONEST service from the promoter.

 

That sums up pretty much how I feel about the situation, good post.

 

Must say I totally agree with both TBirdFrank and acorb's posts.

 

I take Ralph's point, but there have been too many instances recently of getting bookings in by promising locos that are never going to appear, or promising locos that will never run on routes advertised - leading to postponements and eventually cancellations when reality sets in.

Honesty is always the best policy and if that means A preferred choice from Pool A but if it goes LBU another one from that pool its far better then playing Russian roulette with the loco that never was

 

This one next Saturday highlights some of the difficulties faced by tour operators when planning a tour. http://www.tyseleylocoworks.co.uk/tours/tr_2011_0618.htm
First the tour was postponed because of engineering works, when a new date was found one of the proposed engines was unavailable due to other commitments. Another engine was added so as to keep the tour double headed, then shortly before the tour is due to run it's found that the substitute engine is out of gauge at one of the passing stations.
None of it the fault of the tour operator but some people will be disappointed that the tour won't be run as originally advertised. But at least the tour is still going ahead.

 

A strange forum thing here? The thread listing for this topic says last post by Saltydog at 11.36am & highlighted in bold. Yet when you open the topic the last post was Saltydog's at 9.50am which I have already read.

 

Someone voted.

 

Thank you & ADB for the explanation.