Stanmore

• Rostered SS should not have to cover CSA duties at other stations. The Stanmore SS is not happy about the rostered duty covering CSA at Wembley Park on Mondays. This represents poor use of the LULs resources and will increase travelling time for the rostered SS.
• The short shift for the middle turn SS on a Thursday and a Friday finishes too late. This does not fit in with family friendly rostering and is completely unnecessary. The BNS require the middle turn SS to cover the window only until 19.15 on a Thursday and Friday yet their duty finishes at 21.35. If their duties on these days was to start two hours earlier at 13.15 then they could complete their duty at 19.35 and still maintain the required window opening times.
• The proposed roster does not do anything to address the issue of the safety concerns for the night turn SS whilst assisting the terminating trains at the end of traffic. They will still be on their own whilst having to deal with customers who are often intoxicated and regularly aggressive. This issue has been raised before and evidence was produced in the form of several IRFs.
• The BNS only allows for one window to be opened Monday to Friday. This is not enough to cope with the early and mid morning rush especially during the school holidays. The early turn SS should be allowed to open a window to assist the SAMF. Stanmore’s customers are often from out of town, do not have oysters or understand our ticketing systems.

Canons Park

• The further reduction in ticket office opening hours is not acceptable. Opening times of 07.00 to 10.00 Monday to Friday only do not meet the customer’s needs. The POMs and pass agents do not offer the full range of tickets and services that the ticket office does. Customers become angry and frustrated that we will not deal with issues like failed oysters and unresolved journeys whilst the ticket office is closed. They take their frustration out on our staff. There is no sense in closing a ticket office whilst a MF trained SS is on the station.
• The 15 minutes allocated for the SSMF to open the window after commencing their duty is not enough. It may be sufficient time for a SAMF to open the safe, audit the contents, remove a float bag, open the bag, count the bags contents and prepare their account but the SS has many more tasks they must carry out once the take control of a station. The SS needs to get a briefing from the previous SS during the handover, the need to read, understand and possibly act on the contents of the log book (this could be up to 14 days worth), they must check they have the required keys, radios and blackberries etc to hand, they must prepare the service update PA, they might need to sign in or out staff and contractors, emails need to be checked (they often contain important service information) and finally a full station check must be done.

Queensbury

• CSA object to the Tuesday and Thursday split rest days on week two of their roster. This does not help with the work/life balance and is not conducive to family friendly rostering. They currently have Tuesday and Wednesday as their rest day on week two. No other station on the group has these split rest days.
• Loosing the Monday to Friday part time SAMF is unacceptable. One window open during the morning peak is not enough to deal with the demands on the ticket office. Customer service will suffer and revenue lost. Whilst the volume of transactions may now have fallen the complexity of the transactions and the time required to complete them has increased. A large proportion of the SAMFs time is spent resolving oyster journeys replacing failed oysters and increasingly dealing with returned oysters and refunding the deposits. Calling the Oyster help desk can often take 10 to 15 minutes. If only one window is open queues will build up and customers become irate. Staff will suffer as a consequence. If the SS is the only person on the window they are not monitoring the station and will be less able to respond to incidents quickly and effectively.
• The reduction in ticket office opening hours is not acceptable. Having the ticket office closed from 10.15 Monday to Friday and only opening for one hour on a Saturday and two and a half hours on Sunday does not meet the customer’s needs. The POMs and pass agents do not offer the full range of tickets and services that the ticket office does. Customers become angry and frustrated that we will not deal with issues like failed oysters and unresolved journeys whilst the ticket office is closed. They take their frustration out on our staff leading to an increased risk of assault. There is no sense in closing a ticket office whilst a MF trained SS is on the station. Revenue will be lost to LUL as there will be no facility to charge customers who arrive at the station with the wrong ticket.
• The SS start time is to be changed to 06.30 but the SS is expected to be on the window at 06.45. The 15 minutes allocated for the SSMF to open the window after commencing their duty is not enough. It may be sufficient time for a SAMF to open the safe, audit the contents, remove a float bag, open the bag, count the bags contents and prepare their account but the SS has many more tasks they must carry out once the take control of a station. The SS needs to get a briefing from the previous SS during the handover, the need to read, understand and possibly act on the contents of the log book (this could be up to 14 days worth), they must check they have the required keys, radios and blackberries etc to hand, they must prepare the service update PA, they might need to sign in or out staff and contractors, emails need to be checked (they often contain important service information) and finally a full station check must be done.

Kingsbury

• All of the CSAs strongly object to the change to their late turn duties in weeks one and two of the proposed roster giving them a 01.20 finish. This is detrimental to their work/life balance and against any family friendly rostering. Most importantly having the late turn CSA work from 17.20 to
  01.20 serves no purpose and will work to the detriment of the station effecting customer service and safety alike.
• Between 14.15 and 17.20 the SS would be the only member of staff on the station. This is a very busy period at Kingsbury as it is the School run. Kingsbury has three large secondary schools (JFS, Kingsbury and St Gregorys) and one primary school. Demands on staff increase as the younger customers often have ticketing and oyster problems. You also get a higher frequency of help points being activated. If the SS is alone on the gate line the will be unable to assist on the POMs, monitor the station and respond to help points whilst maintaining the high standards of safety and customer service LUL and our customers demand.
• This will also be a busy period for the newly installed lifts as this is the time of day when customers are more likely to come through with push chairs. This is just the time we need a CSA to assist the SS in the monitoring of the station.
• The lifts can be operated by a single member of staff. There is no need to keep a CSA on until 01.20. Wood Lane station which has the same lifts has a proposed CSA roster with a 22.45 finish for the late turn. There is no reason why the late turn CSA duty should not be 14.15 to 22.15 as it is at Queensbury and Canons Park.
• The SS start time is to be changed to 06.30 but the SS is expected to be on the window at 06.45. The 15 minutes allocated for the SSMF to open the window after commencing their duty is not enough. It may be sufficient time for a SAMF to open the safe, audit the contents, remove a float bag, open the bag, count the bags contents and prepare their account but the SS has many more tasks they must carry out once the take control of a station. The SS needs to get a briefing from the previous SS during the handover, the need to read, understand and possibly act on the contents of the log book (this could be up to 14 days worth), they must check they have the required keys, radios and blackberries etc to hand, they must prepare the service update PA, they might need to sign in or out staff and contractors, emails need to be checked (they often contain important service information) and finally a full station check must be done.
• Losing the Monday to Friday part time SAMF and the weekend SAMF is unacceptable. One window open during the morning peak is not enough to deal with the demands on the ticket office. Customer service will suffer. Whilst the volume of transactions may now have fallen the complexity of the transactions and the time required to complete them has increased. A large proportion of the SAMFs time is spent resolving oyster journeys replacing failed oysters and increasingly dealing with returned oysters and refunding the deposits. Calling the Oyster help desk can often take 10 to 15 minutes. If only one window is open queues will build up and customers become irate. Staff will suffer as a consequence. If the SS is the only person on the window they are not monitoring the station and will be less able to respond to incidents quickly and effectively.
• The reduction in total ticket office opening hours is not acceptable. Having the ticket office closed from 10.30 Monday to Friday and only opening for one and three quarter hours on a Saturday and two hours on Sunday does not meet the customer’s needs. The POMs and pass agents do not offer the full range of tickets and services that the ticket office does. Customers become angry and frustrated that we will not deal with issues like failed oysters and unresolved journeys whilst the ticket office is closed. They take their frustration out on our staff leading to a greater risk of assault. There is no sense in closing a ticket office whilst a MF trained SS is on the station. Revenue will be lost. A closed ticket offices only pushes the problem further down the line to the few remaining stations that do have a ticket office.

Wembley Park

• The reduction in the SAMF roster from five to four positions will result in only one window being open at the stadium ticket office at all times Monday to Friday. This is not acceptable and will adversely affect staff and customer service alike.
• Whilst the volume of transactions may now have fallen due to oyster at some ticket offices the complexity of the transactions and the time required to complete them has increased. A large proportion of the SAMFs time is spent resolving oyster journeys replacing failed oysters and increasingly dealing with returned oysters and refunding the deposits. Calling the Oyster help desk can often take 10 to 15 minutes. If only one window is open queues will build up and customers become irate. This adversely affects stress levels for staff as the will get the brunt of the customers frustration and also because the will be frustrated in their desire to provide great customer service. Staff are also at greater risk of assault.
• Due to the large number of hotels around Wembley Park the ticket office has to deal with a large number of tourists. Their requirements are different to a regular commuter and transactions often take longer as they need things explaining.
• If the SAMF is on their own, large queues will build at the main window. They then will be unable to assist on the excess window resulting in a loss of revenue for LUL.
• With only one window open will not be able to cope with the extra customers we get at an Arena event. Many of these customers are from out of town and arrive with the wrong tickets which require changing. The Arena has a capacity of 12,000 the majority of whom use the station. After an event without the window capacity ticketless customers will be let through without paying to make sure they do not miss their last trains.
• The proposed SAMF roster will reduce the number of weekend rest days. This is not acceptable as it adversely affects the work/life balance for staff and family friendly rostering. Over a 20 week period the SAMFs currently have eight Saturdays and 12 Sundays off. The new roster will give them just five Saturdays and ten Sundays.
• The proposal to reduce the CSA roster from 20 to 14 CSAs is unworkable, dangerous and unacceptable.
• The stadium gate line has 26 gates with the WAGs at opposite ends. It is neither safe nor practical for one CSA to man these gates alone for over one and a half hours in the morning and nearly two and a half hours between 23.00 and 01.20. A CSA assisting a customer at one end would not see and would be unable to respond quickly to a child getting stuck in a gate at the other end.
• Staff alone on the gate line will be more vulnerable to assault.
• Two CSAs on stadium gate line from 06.30 to 23.00 is still not enough. No staff will be available to assist MIPs and VIPs. We will not be able to fulfil our commitment to our customers for a world class service. We will barely be able to provide any service at all.
• Reductions in staffing numbers will cause severe curtailing of staffs ability to offer a good level of service. Wembley Park has a high number of tourists and a high level of immigrants with limited English making face to face contact much more valuable. With fewer staff the customers will have little recourse to advice on tickets and travel.
• Skeleton staffing levels on the gate line will leave no one free to queue bust which will be in greater demand due to the reduction in windows.
• Our ability to respond to service disruption and any incidents will be greatly reduced. Staff will not be available to terminate trains and dwell times will increase causing trains to be held in section and limiting service controls ability to reform the service.
• The BNS does not take into account the station security checks carried out in accordance with the Transec regulations. These are a legal requirement. They are carried out every two hours and take at least 45 minutes to carry them out properly.
• The late turn SS has been allocated two and a half hours of gate line duties. Part of this time is when the middle turn SS is on their meal break. At that time the late turn SS is the only SS on the station. A large busy station like Wembley needs its SS to be able to respond quickly to incidents for the safe operation of the railway. The SS should not be tied down to specific duties at busy times of the day.
• No accounting has been made for the future increase of customer demand at Wembley Park. The Ark Academy opens soon and will have an initial capacity of 1600 but could be expanded to 3000.

Neasden

• Losing the Monday to Friday full time SAMF and the weekend SAMF is unacceptable. One window open during the morning peak is not enough to deal with the demands on the ticket office. Customer service will suffer. Whilst the volume of transactions may now have fallen the complexity of the transactions and the time required to complete them has increased. A large proportion of the SAMFs time is spent resolving oyster journeys replacing failed oysters and increasingly dealing with returned oysters and refunding the deposits. Calling the Oyster help desk can often take 10 to 15 minutes. If only one window is open queues will build up and customers become irate. Staff will suffer as a consequence with an increases risk of assault.
• The reduction in total ticket office opening hours is not acceptable. Having the ticket office closed from 10.15 Monday to Friday and only opening for four hours on Saturday and Sunday does not meet the customer’s needs. The POMs and pass agents do not offer the full range of tickets and services that the ticket office does. Customers become angry and frustrated that we can not deal with issues like failed oysters and unresolved journeys whilst the ticket office is closed. They will take their frustration out on staff. There is no sense in closing a ticket office whilst a MF trained SS is on the station. Revenue will be lost.
• Up to now Neasden has had a pass agent on the station premises directly opposite the ticket office window. This agent does about half the ticket transactions on the station. When the window is shut he does the majority. It has been confirmed the he will vacate his premises in December to allow for the expansion of the gate line. There are no other pass agents in the vicinity of Neasden station. The nearest on being about a half mile walk. This will dramatically increase the demand for ticket issuing facilities at Neasden at a time we are reducing them!
• Staff assaults will increase as a consequence as customers become frustrated at our failure to offer them the service they expect.
• If the SS is the only person on the window they are not monitoring the station and will be less able to respond to incidents quickly and effectively. Neasden is a very busy station and also has a very complex area of track under its jurisdiction with many points and section switches on both the Met and Jubilee. The SS needs to be able to respond quickly to problems on the track like securing the points after a signal failure otherwise the train service implications can be severe with trains held in section and long delays to our customers.
• The SS start time is to be changed to 06.30 but the SS is expected to be on the window at 06.45. The 15 minutes allocated for the SSMF to open the window after commencing their duty is not enough. It may be sufficient time for a SAMF to open the safe, audit the contents, remove a float bag, open the bag, count the bags contents and prepare their account but the SS has many more tasks they must carry out once the take control of a station. The SS needs to get a briefing from the previous SS during the handover, the need to read, understand and possibly act on the contents of the log book (this could be up to 14 days worth), they must check they have the required keys, radios and blackberries etc to hand, they must prepare the service update PA, they might need to sign in or out staff and contractors, emails need to be checked (they often contain important service information) and finally a full station check must be done. Neasden is a complex station with four platforms and two lines. Station checks cannot be taken for granted or rushed. The safety of staff and customers must not be compromised.