A damning indictment of Irish Rail's Intercity service.

[sean]

Read this thread on Green Issues on Boards.ie about a week ago, I didn't know it was this bad, particularly vis-a-vis international standards.

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showt...p?t=2055188717

Thoughts?

[Thomas Ralph]

Just a bad day I think and a lack of familiarity with the regular procedures.

[Mark Gleeson]

That guy just has a problem

1. This place with the rubbish and fire extinguisher is behind a locked door and is the luggage van, there is then another door in the first coach vestibule then the sliding door in the first coach. The luggage area is totally off limits, thats called looking for trouble where there isn't any

2. Crossing a closed ticket barrier is an offense, if he had waited the IE head would have told him to board the first coach

3. It is fairly common to issue a supplement ticket for traveling in a higher class

4. He could have gone second class for 31 euro if he booked online

5. Having a split between ticket sales and collection machines is again normal, to be fair to IE at least they take cash at the machines, Virgin trains in the UK are obsessed with credit card sales

6. IE's online ticketing system can handle all these

*The options available when buying a ticket on French railways (depending on train type) include:

1) One way and round trip 1st and 2nd class

Yes and first out second back is also possible

2) Facing or your back to the direction of travel

Yes, you choose the seat

3) Solo seats when travelling on one’s own

Can't see the point

4) Duo seating for two people travelling together – with the choice of face to face or beside each other.

Yes, you choose the seat

5) If you are travelling on the same train as a business contact, if s/he tells you his car and seat number, you can enter these data and the system when making your reservation, and it puts all parties sitting together – despite the fact that they have made their reservations independently.

Yes, you choose the seat, just get the seat number from your friend

7) Window or corridor seat preferred?

Again you choose


7. Staff attitude is a fair cop but being ignorant and troublesome is asking for trouble

8. Ride issue is known

9. Power sockets work fine once you push the reset button in, of course he could have asked

10. If he had tried this in France he wouldn't have even been let on the train since its compulsory reservations on the bulk of long distance services, all TGV services

[KSW]

Wow talking about wanting trouble !!, If you want to find something bad your going to find the service bad.... """seat your ass down on the seat of the train, zip your drink and enjoy the freakin journey"""

[StephenM]

Someone should buy that person a ticket on any flight out of here, they obviously don't want to be in this country.

[Mark Gleeson]

To be fair he does make some valid points about the staff attitude and presentation.

His whole thesis about ticket sales and reservations is utter rubbish

[KSW]

Agree, No staff member in any company should have this attitude. I have to be honest when saying this about 90% of IE staff have some serious problems in attitude and I think they should be dismissed from the job.....
The guy from the journey has I agree good points everything expect the Online booking there's no flaw in that its just there attitude.
I remember a time when I lost my ticket first time ever, I put it in one of the ticket machines at Connolly for the 18:35 Rosslare service and walking up to P5 I noticed I had nothing in my coat pocket and I went back to one very polite guy and he said its okay you passed the ticket check.... I knew the guy at Gorey train station and so I rang him standing at P5 to inform him of my situation he also said its fine if you need me to comfirm to the ticket inspector about your ticket just ring the station so I said thanks and that was that. UNTIL the ticket inspector came around at rathdrum when the train was standing at the platform he said ticket, I told him about the ticket situation and I offered to ring Gorey train station just as prove, He said you dont have a ticket, I said no and explained to him that the ticket officer at Connolly also said it was okay. I rang Gorey train station and the train ticket inspector said "did he ring you about his ticket" Gorey said "Yes I am aware of his situation I sold the ticket to him this afternoon"... After the train ticket inspector hung up he said You dont have a ticket please get off the train, I was shocked I mean who does this guy think he is anyway I existed the train with fury. About 10seconds later the ticket inspector let me back on the train in through the drivers cabin and I sat down. Arriving at Gorey this ticket A-hole came down to me and got my arm and gripped it and brought me to the Gorey officer who was on the platform. I said to the train ticket inspector will you let me go. The Gorey officer said yes is this the guy who I sold the ticket this afternoon then the train inspector saying "Sorry" and walked back to the train I said just sorry after everything you've done Oh No believe me you will hear more of this........ I wrote to Iarnrod Eireann and told them of this manner I was treated in and they wrote back "Dear Mr.Keith xxxx, I deeply apolgise for the manner that our staff member treated you in. I have followed up on your details regarding time/date and as of today the staff member you were treated by is dismissed from working with Iarnrod Eireann. Thank you for writing to us regarding the manner of this staff member, Again i deeply apolgise and I hope this will not affect your travelling on the Rosslare/Gorey rail service.

I havent seen this guy since so the company is much better without people like this....

[MrX]

Mark,

That's actually not the normal situation on the CDE.

The luggage van is open to the rest of the train, the doors are rarely closed and you can see into it / walk into it without any problems.

Perhaps the doors *should* be closed, but it's never been the case.

I've also been on trains where the glass doors failed / we bypassed at the head of 1st class and the luggage van doors were wide open. This resulted in a stench of rubbish wafting through the unnecessarily drafty coach.

The problem is the on-board cleaners walk in and out of that area and don't keep the doors shut.

Also, it's questionable as to whether on-board cleaners should be hanging around in that area if there are indeed loose heavy objects.

I would also think it would be prudent practice to lock down / belt down heavy items in there.

You can get large items being carried in fast track service and also I've seen items of heavy railway equipment i.e. parts for trains en route to Cork in there. These large metal objects could potentially fly around if the train crashed / derailed.

If stowed in the middle of the coach, they could potentially shoot through the doors and into the first class area. Those glass doors wouldn't stop anything.

However, I would be more worried about the poor unfortunate cleaner who might be 'hanging out' in there. He/she could quite easily be pommelled by heavy objects. I think the HSA/RSA needs to take a look at how they're handling this issue.

Also, while it has improved, the train hosts need to ensure that people don't stow heavy items overhead. I've seen crazy things put on overhead racks in many trains. It's really up to staff to take those items and put them into a luggage rack, or into the luggage van if there's no space available.

I don't fully agree with the boards.ie poster, but I do think the management of the luggage van is very sloppy.

[Mark Gleeson]

The doors into the luggage van are meant to be locked, I've never seen them open

They are a set of bi parting manually operated doors, its glass reinforced plastic with a metal frame, they will take a huge amount of punishment, they are not the single sheet no frame partition doors.

[MrX]

I've seen them open on many an occasion and I take CityGold fairly regularly. It seems the cleaning staff just leave them open as it's a lot of hassle to close them. As they're cleaning the train they bring the bags back into that area and leave them there.