Alex's Bloody-Minded Highland Expedition - Part 2

Apropos of the original post...

Arrived home in London last week to discover... one free Anytime Return to Inverness valid from August 14th. They even booked me a seat.

Have arranged B&B and a copy of The Thirty-Nine Steps to read on the way.

Will I stay for one night or spend a few days exploring Scotland? Place bets now!

Alex's Bloody-Minded Highland Expedition

Let's start with the backstory.

Two months ago I had a crappy experience with East Coast. Terribly late, poor information about the problem, bad organization[*], rude staff, the works. Ticked every box on the "crap railway journey" checklist. Arrived back in London too late to get home and had to harangue the few remaining staff at King's Cross into paying for a cab (initially they insisted I take the night bus back to SE4 - two hours of pot smoke and ringtones with a high chance of stabbing. Thanks guys, that's real courtesy.). Others came off even worse - one poor girl needed a taxi all the way to Aldershot.

Never one to miss a bit of righteous indignation I wrote them a letter.

A bit self-important but hey, if you treat your customers like crap it shouldn't go unremarked. If the British weren't such masochists they'd get a lot more respect from business. I mailed it off with proof of purchase like their website asks and because I'm an untrusting sod took a copy of the tickets first.

Lucky I did. Six weeks later, nothing. Rather than letting it drop I get really mad. Phone calls never work - nothing said on the phone is provable (except if you're the one who recorded it for "fact verification purposes") so I write another letter. This time it's sent recorded delivery and by now I'm really, really pissed off.

Four days later, something. Three pages of it. "I have checked our records and your original letter never arrived" [paraphrased]... "we aim to answer all queries within 10 working days" ['aim', not guarantee - I might similarly express an aim to swim to the moon]... "I am concerned that you are unhappy"... "offer you a standard class complementary return journey for one person on any of our services...".

Probably the best I'm going to get. It's reasonable to protect their employees privacy by not cc'ing an irate passenger customer[*] into the disciplinary process but asserting that the complaint never arrived? Hm. My cynical side wonders if it's just an foolproof way to deter the laziest 80% of complainants.

Something in their response catches my eye.

You say any of your services...

Most people (well, the tiny subset of most people who care at all) think East Coast run their trains from London to Edinburgh. A handful continue to Aberdeen. Time for a chat with my train buff father...

It turns out they don't. Heaven knows why but East Coast run one train a day to Inverness. Departs London at midday and arrives on the icy northern tundra, 568 miles away, precisely eight hours and eight minutes later. About the same time it takes to fly to New York but with fewer skyscrapers. (I don't actually know what goes on in Inverness, I've never been there before). Do it at the weekend and for £25 each way you can upgrade to first. North of Newcastle it's one of the most picturesque rail journeys in the world and there's free wifi all the way. Two days programming time with excellent views, free at-seat refreshments and hell, I needn't even log off Facebook.

So I do what any footloose and fancy free IT consultant would. I'm off to the Scottish Highlands in a 125mph air-conditioned office powered entirely by righteous anger in...



"Alex's Bloody-Minded Highland Expedition"


Watch this space.





[1] When a train's already so late the passengers are due refunds why delay it even more to catch a fare dodger? What revenue have you lost? Muppets.
[2] At what point did passengers become customers? What's the difference? Semantic juggling at some mid-privatisation 90's head office for shits 'n giggles or do "customers" have fewer rights?