Train overcrowding: how to fight back.

Ever since this article on the BBC a couple of weeks ago thoughts have been running through my head about how the humble commuter, fed up with being treated worse than a sardine can fight back.

Of course we are only in this position because the companies themselves and the government refuse to do anything about it. Mind you, I am guessing if they were all faced with having to travel by train on a daily basis and not in first class they would quickly do something about it. Lord Young and others are probably at least privately thinking that commuters have never had it so good.

As far as I can work out there are only two ways we can attack the problem.

Breach of Contract (Small claims court)

This I envisage working similar to the banking charges saga. The BBC article linked gave me the signpost.

Under their franchise agreements train operators are required to use "reasonable endeavours" to give peak passengers "a reasonable expectation of a seat within 20 minutes of boarding"

Not exactly great legally crisp wording but there is something here we can work with. Essentially if the conditions are not met you could perhaps claim that the train operator has broken their contract with you which was made when you purchased the ticket based on all relevant legislation and contracts including the franchise agreement.

All we have to do is sort out the test of reasonableness to see if you can make a claim. First we need a reference period. The train operator would clearly be able to wriggle out of a claim if it was based on 1 or 2 journeys or the train was late, weather delays, other delays or delays outside of its control. So lets say 5 journeys on the same train or at around the same time would constitute a reasonable reference period. This is a week of commuting or five regular journeys over a different period.

Now the line states that you have a reasonable expectation of finding a seat within 20 minutes. So any journey under 30 minutes (must be scheduled journey time not actual journey time) is not going to be worth claiming for, again you would need to take into account any delays, which would not count towards the 30 minutes.

Next a reasonable expectation of finding a seat, in order to prove this you would have to walk up and down the carriages looking for a seat, so the best thing to do is only claim when you cannot walk up and down the carriages as clearly in this circumstance you do not have a reasonable chance of finding a seat.

Again if you wanted to be really clever and possibly evil you could find a railway employee and ask them if you have a reasonable expectation of finding a seat on the train (use that exact wording). This would be extra juicy evidence against the company as they are a representative of the company giving a professional opinion. You could also consider collecting witness statements from people on the same train. Don't worry too much about witness statements as the onus would be on the company to prove you wrong, plus as long as overcrowding is regular if they contested it you could take a video camera on the next journey. The company cant make the problem go away over night.

You would also need to submit evidence of tickets, at least the photocopies. If it is not a season ticket you may wish to consider submitting the originals or at the very least offering to surrender the ticket if your claim is subject to refund. Obviously with a season ticket you can submit a copy. Also note that any claim should only be for the contested journeys, you cant claim a refund of a season ticket based on five journeys. In this case you must work out the proportion of the ticket that relates to those journeys.

So in summary to make a claim you need to fulfil these pre-requisites:

• Scheduled journey time of over 30 minutes
• 5 journeys on the same train or 5 journeys at roughly the same time over a regular frequency
• a valid ticket
• details of the trains travelled on
• Unable to walk up and down to find a seat

If you have fulfilled all these requirements then you can start a similar two step process to the reclaim of bank charges.

Step 1 is write to the train company, perhaps something like this:

Dear Customer Services,

I am writing to complain about the state of overcrowding on your peak time trains. As a regular user it is clear to me that you are doing nothing to address overcrowding and are therefore in breach of the commitment in your franchise agreement:

"train operators are required to use reasonable endeavours to give peak passengers a reasonable expectation of a seat within 20 minutes of boarding

Here are the details of the trains I travelled on, the journey times and my comments on the availability of seats:

etc etc

I have also enclosed a copy of my ticket/s for your reference.

You have 28 days to reply to this letter detailing the steps you will take to solve the overcrowding issues on these trains. In addition, I am claiming a full refund for the price of the tickets attached as you have clearly and persistently failed to fulfil the terms of agreement under which they were bought.

If you do not provide satisfactory recompense within 28 days then you will leave me with no choice but to pursue the matter through the civil courts.

Yours sincerely etc.

Sit back and wait for a response, the options here are that you get ignored, fobbed off or offered some compensation.

If you get ignored, check their customer service agreement and write one more time quoting their customer service agreement and giving them a final 28 days to reply. You may wish to copy in the Managing Director, chances are the letter will just get forward on the customer services department and match up with your other letter, but you never know. If the ignore you a second time then you have now made every reasonable endeavour to resolve the matter with the company (this will be important in any legal claim) and you can now put in your claim with the courts for full compensation.

If they fob you off, reply re-iterating your position detailing the breach of agreement and detail any more subsequent experiences. Then as above head to the small claims court.

If you get offered some compensation my personal advice would be to take it, even if it is not the full amount. The fact that they have offered you compensation and you have refused to take it would count in the company's favour in any claim. So best to take what's offered and make a new claim in the future if they do not take "reasonable actions" to avoid overcrowding.

Of course the first few claims will be hard but if one ends up at court and the commuter wins then like the bank charges that is a legal precedent which will pave the way for everyone to claim and companies will start paying up at the letter stage. They will also quite quickly start addressing capacity issues as it now hurting their profits.

At the moment this is an idea, but you never know it just might work. If anyone does try the above approach can you keep us up-to-date with any responses etc. I am quite happy to post any rail company responses, good or bad.

Health and Safety

The other approach I have thought about is claiming a fundamental breach of your health and safety if you are required to stand. However, anecdotally there seems to be no research which shows you are at higher risk in an overcrowded train. So this seems to be a non starter unless anyone knows of any research or can commission some.

Finally, I should also mention that I am not a regular commuter on trains, but have on occasion had to commute into London where the train has been totally rammed with people. So despite a good idea I am unable to follow up on it myself.

thesalaryconverter.com: How to... work out your pro rata salary

I have been meaning to write some "how to" articles for thesalaryconverter.com one of my many projects.

There are some things the converter can do if you knows one or two tricks.

How to ... calculate a pro-rata salary

We have all seen jobs advertise at £23,000 per year pro rata to 22 hours. Which is great but it doesn't tell you what your actual salary is going to be and you need to work out whether that means you are better or worse off compared to your current salary.

Example

Take the pro rata salary and type in your salary as "23,000" but leave the hours as 37. Press the magic button and you get the conversions. Remember the hourly rate which is £11.92.

Go back to the main page and type in "11.92" set the period to hourly and type in the actual hours of your job which is "22".

Press the magic button and you can see that your annual salary will be £13,673.

If you knew you were earning £14,000 for a full time job you would now know you would only be slightly worse off if you took the new part time job.

Easy when you know how.

How to ... pick your targets

The Simon Cowell approach.

Think of the job you want to apply for think of your skills, qualifications and experience for the job. Now Simon has the list of skills, qualifications and experience in front of him. You walk into the room and he ticks them off one by one. At the end of the interview he will either tell you, you have the job or tell you its not for you. Be honest because Simon will, are you good enough?

The reason I bring Simon Cowell into recruitment is because everyone has seen on the X-factor all those people who have deluded themselves that they are the next number 1 star and it is clear to everyone they are not. Applications are just the same, are you deluding yourself that you are the best?

The Way forward.

Create the check-list of skills, qualifications and experience for the job you want. Tick off the ones you already have, err on the side of caution or better still get someone else to objectively tick off the list.

For most jobs I recommend that you need at least half of the list ticked to stand a chance and that is just to get through to the next stage, not necessarily the job.

If you have less than half checked you have a few choices:

• Go for a lower position and work your way up.
• Do volunteer work in your spare time to give you some more relevant experience.
• Study for some of the qualifications.

Keep doing all of the above while you continue to make applications. Although you will get a lot of knock backs you are gaining experience and continue to add to the ticks on the list. Sooner or later you should get where you want to go but be prepared for the long haul.

If you are not prepared for the long haul and still have less than half checked really think about whether there is any point in applying. Consider how competitive the field is as well, will there be lots of high quality applicants? Your application as well as being considered in isolation will be compared to all the other applications. Recruiters do not have time to interview everyone who meet the minimum check-list criteria.

In the UK the public sector and sometimes the private sector create the check-list for you, it is the person specification. In short-listing the person specification is just checked against the application, depending on the number of applicants and the quality a score threshold is put in place and everyone above that score is invited to interview. So the higher your score the better chance you have of being interviewed.

So the first step in an application should be about being realistic about which jobs you are going to apply for. Pick your targets and put your efforts into securing that job. The scatter gun method of applying for every job rarely works.

A good application will take time to put together and therefore you need to choose carefully which jobs you apply for, after all you do not want to waste your time do you.

Next up How to ... write a good CV

How to ... Introduction

They sometimes say it is best to write about what you know, most of this blog is just random thoughts straying down my fingers and typed into words. A lot of the blog is simply a post it note for my brain, it saves having to remember everything.

I work in HR and I have previously shared some of my interview experiences offering some tips to people to give them a good chance at getting the job they want.

For one recent mass recruitment project I wrote a two page guidance note for people that did not get short-listed. Due to the numbers involved we were unable to offer specific feedback and too be honest the feedback for all of the 'regrets' (what we politely call failures) was exactly the same. They all made the same mistakes.

Recently I interviewed a candidate who had failed the first time round, on the short walk to the interview room they explained how I had helped them last time they applied, how they had taken the feedback away and really taken the information on board. They then explained how this was there nth application for the job and they were a bit nervous because it meant so much to them.

I had looked at both their new and old application form, they really had taken the advice and had nailed the application second time around.

At interview they nailed that too, although nervous they clearly emphasised their skills, experience and suitability for the job. It struck me that without that bit of advice I gave them originally they might have missed out on a job and we would have missed out on a great new employee.

Sometimes all people need is a bit of advice and no one in the recruitment world really gives practical advice especially in the early stages. The recruitment process is not perfect, we can only hire those who evidence their ability, if your not good at interviews or application forms we could easily miss you.

I have decided to write a short series of 'How to...' articles to help those that are looking for practical advice on how not to miss out on a job they could do.

First up 'How to ... pick your targets.'