Abellio Greater Anglia, commonly known just as Greater Anglia or GA, are the train company that currently run the Great Eastern Mainline (GEML) railway franchise in Great Britain. However, there is nothing great about the company or the services they run.
Like many commuters, I use the railways five days a week, every week to get to and from work, in my case, I travel from Shenfield (SNF), the station nearest to where I live, and Chelmsford (CHM), the station opposite where I work. And in my case, I generally travel to work at lunch time and home again in the evening.
As many commuters who use GA to get to and from work, most of, if not all of the trains are old, terrible and generally in a poor state of repair. GA owns and uses the following classes of trains that I've had to use:
Class 315 - which were built between 1980 and 1981, making them between 33 and 34 years old - GA owns all 61 of these bad boys, generally used for the Shenfield to Liverpool Street metro services and Western Anglia. No toilets, uncomfortable seats and quite terrible.
Class 321 - which were built between 1988 and 1991, making them between 23 and 26 years old - GA own most of them, the rest owned by London Midland, First Capital Connect and Northern Rail. I have had to use these, generally uncomfortable, small, smelly toilets. One of them has recently been refit to become the 321 Demonstrator, the abomination that GA created to show what they planned to do instead of replacing them.
Class 360 - which were built between 2002 and 2003 for the 21 four carriage versions GA uses, making them just 11 or 12 years old, some on the newest trains GA owns. Heathrow Connect owns 5 five carriage versions. These are comfortable enough, but often with threadbare seats and smelly toilets.
GA also own other ageing trains, some as old as the 315's, some actually older, yet GA refuses to spend money on replacing the 23 year old + trains and ill maintains all of their trains, instead, they spend their money on replacing signs at train stations that don't need to be replaced, I actually saw them doing this at Shenfield yesterday (1 July) and I thought April Fools was supposed to be on 1 April.
Because of how old and badly maintained their trains are, GA often has delays and cancellations thanks to mysterious train faults. Looking at their Twitter feed (@greateranglia) you can see tweets popping up left, right and centre about train faults. Come on now, is it much of a surprise when most of their trains are over 20 or 30 years old? Could you own a car that old and not expect it to go wrong occasionally? No! Get replacing them GA. The money GA regularly spend on fixing train faults, repainting old and knackered trains, rebranding, reupholstering old tired seats could be saved up and used to replace them all together.
Give us some 21st century trains for 21st century travelling, other train companies are doing it, why can't GA? Their excuse is that because their franchise is so short they won't invest in new trains when it's possible another company is going to take over once the franchise is over. Now if I understand the franchise bidding properly, GA can bid to keep their franchise, bidding against the companies who want to take it on. Is it just me who thinks that if GA invested some money in new, more reliable, more comfortable trains, it might actually help them keep their franchise? The only reason the GEML franchise changes hands so frequently is because the companies that have run it, infrequently invest money where they should invest it, spending money on other things instead, like replacing signs that don't need to be replaced and lining the bosses pockets with gold and silver, taken from commuters who are paying over the odds for bad service.
I have said all this and I haven't even mentioned GA's week of hell. The week commencing Monday 16 June 2014. Which included the mother of all bad days, Tuesday 17 June. Just before the evening rush hour, a train snagged on the overhead power cables somewhere between Ingatestone and Chelmsford, which caused the train to fail and block the line coming out of London. Commuters working in London then endured an evening of hell trying to get home, rather than getting back to Chelmsford at somewhere between 5pm and 8pm, most didn't return until between 9pm and 10pm. I am led to believe, by a M&S customer, that the Monday was as bad, although I don't know the exact circumstances. Because GA were concentrating on getting the thousands of London commuters home (which for once was probably the right thing to do) it meant that I had to get a rail replacement bus in the opposite direction to Shenfield, taking me past the problem and to my destination station, everyone who wanted to go further had to get on the Metro services from Shenfield to their chosen station.
Then we have to talk about 17 May, when I was waiting 90 minutes for a train at Shenfield for a train to Chelmsford. I ended up being late for work, this was down to someone being hit by a train, something you can't really blame GA for. But they still issue delay repay compensation for people who are delayed by over 30 minutes. When I tried to claim this, they asked for my ticket, which I had already got rid of (opps). But given the fact it was a season ticket, I suggested they look it up on their system. Shortly afterwards, I got a letter, which I've attached to this blog, which issues me with travel voucher making up for my delay repay claims for 17 May and 17 June. Another twist in the story was that a day or two after I received the letter, I received an e-mail saying that if I don't sent GA my ticket they can't issue me with the refund, a refund they already had given to me. The letter was signed by Mike London and the e-mail signed by Lois Driver. Now Mike and Lois, it might be worth talking to each other, so one of you doesn't tell me one thing and the other tell me the complete opposite.
Anyway, I've had my own for today, I'll sign off now and leave you all to your devices.
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