(22 Aug 2021, 10:14 pm)stagecoachbusdepot wrote Assuming you actually find a bus that has any of them on board...I think there have been a grand total of two people finding one reported on here despite the hot air around these changes being fully supported by printed material. I finally did manage to get hold of one today - when the driver of a Voltra gave me their dog-eared copy as they hadn't seen any on the buses and there were of course none on theirs. This was after asking the driver of another service (which I won't identify) who was great and had a look for me and was really vocal (un-prompted other than me asking if they had a service change leaflet) about what they viewed as a disgraceful lack of customer info on board the vehicles. I was surprised they were so critical of the company, but can fully understand why given the multiple examples on here of being being unable to source either the changes booklet or any of the timetables - and they know they will be the ones getting it in the neck off the customers in less than a fortnight. Add to this that even the website still shows the old pdfs (if any at all) for some services (after changing the date) and from the outside looking in this does seem an amateurish attempt by GNE to communicate some fairly huge network changes.
Issues aside with the difficulties of finding one (although pleased you finally did!), I have to disagree about the lack of customer info. Every bus I've travelled on over the past week has had the poster up about it, which in my opinion is enough to prompt someone to find out further information. You wouldn't just stick your fingers in your ears and pretend it's not happening, if you couldn't find a booklet on board. You'd either go online (if you can) or you'd give them a call, and I'd hope customer services would be more than willing to post a booklet out for those who cannot get online.
The timetables on the website also work fine, if you change the date to one in the future. This is a much better (and accessible) way of presenting a timetable.
(23 Aug 2021, 4:28 am)Dan wrote Enough posters were printed for every bus in the fleet, and every bus with a next stop announcement TFT monitor is also showing a notice. There are regular social media posts about the upcoming changes, and they have been on the website for weeks. The journey planner on the website/app and “live timetables” were updated back then, and PDFs of the timetables (which are proven to get a very low number of views on the website) are slowly being drip fed through once converted from print format to web format.
Not every timetable has been printed yet (it is peak holiday season across all industries) - those that have are distributed on buses already and are being followed up with subsequent print batches on a weekly basis. Go North East is working with Nexus to try and resurrect racks in bus stations but those discussions are still ongoing.
Not withstanding all that, there have been some pretty major last minute changes following further consultation with local authorities. Bearing in mind these changes have been known about at local authority officer level for some six months, and, contrary to comments on social media, there has been a massive amount of consultation with local authorities, politicians and other stakeholders, these changes were only being requested AFTER the registrations were submitted, Go North East is doing a pretty damn good job during trying times. It’s peak holiday season with many colleagues needing to cancel their holidays just to get this information out to customers in good time, as well as work bloody long (12-16 hour) days (and won’t get paid for these extra hours nor likely get the time back).
It takes roughly half a day to typeset a timetable, and probably another half a day to produce a map. It then takes an hour or two to proof-check the leaflet and its content (depending on how in depth you proof-check the times). Work technically can’t commence until after registrations have been submitted (although were in this instance given the sheer volume of changes), so I will let you do the maths of how many services are changing (and hence how much time this would take to do) vs the 56 days for the registration period.
In my opinion your comments are outlandish and in the main unfounded.
The posters are certainly visible. It's what prompted me to ask about the booklet in the first place, so clearly doing their job.
I do agree that a lot of the comments are unfair and some of it is certainly down to resistance to change, but it does surprise me that the biggest stakeholder for any bus operator (the customer) is still missing from the consultation process. Asking customers who use the service is always going to get you a more reflective response than an officer at a Council or local Councillors, both of whom are unlikely to actually use the bus services impacted.
This isn't one operator though; it's something the industry need to improve on as a whole, and hopefully something that will be outlined in customer charters drawn up under the impending enhanced partnership schemes.
(23 Aug 2021, 7:59 am)streetdeckfan wrote Why would they request changes be made before the public have been informed?
That would rid them of the opportunity to go to the newspapers and cry about how bad GNE are and how much they care about the people!
If they did that work behind the scenes then the public will never know and they won't get the recognition they 'deserve'
To be fair, casework for Councillors and MPs is largely reactive, so a lot of them 'crying about how bad GNE are', will be in reaction to receiving a lot of correspondence from angry constituents. If, as above, consultation included the biggest stakeholder (the customer), this could be picked up at the consultation stage.
LNER and Transpennine Express, for example, are consulting with the public now on May 2022 changes. A proposal is presented, and feedback is requested. It's no more complicated than that.