More rail passengers across Britain are satisfied with their train services than last year, according to the industry's watchdog Transport Focus.
But this new research seems to be completely contradictory to other research that we published on The Customer Service Blog last
week from the consumer organisation ‘Which?’ suggesting that train customers
are now LESS satisfied with their train service. So who do we believe?
According to the research by Transport
Focus, 83% of the 27,000 people surveyed said they were satisfied with
services, an improvement of 3% on last year.
But according to Anthony Smith, the
CEO of Transport Focus: "These green shoots are fragile and need
nurturing. This recovery will be under pressure from upgrade works, industrial
relationship problems and rising passenger numbers. So the industry needs to
keep a relentless, ongoing focus on performance and reliability."
Mr Smith added that customer
satisfaction in London and south-east England had increased from 79% to 82%. He
said: "The figures for Southern in particular show a significant recovery
in passengers' experience with a number of factors including the helpfulness
and availability of on board staff and also of staff at the station."
Who were the best and worst train
companies?
Hull Trains and the Heathrow Express
scored joint first in the National Rail Passenger Survey - with 97%
satisfaction.
Southern Rail had the worst customer
satisfaction rating. This is almost certainly due to a recent dispute between
Southern Rail and the Trade Unions over plan to change the role of guards on
driver-only trains resulted in extensive industrial action with 58,983 Southern
services affected.
Thameslink, Great Northern, Great
Western Railway and South Eastern were among the other low-scoring companies in
the survey - although South Eastern's score was up by 10% from a year ago.
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