

Handling the London Waterloo rush hour on Twitter - blearyeyed
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-18547819

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gouranga
I suffer South West Trains quite regularly. This is all spin over an utter
turd of a service (Twitter included as it's useless and about as real time as
tea leaf readings)

SWT reality trip:

a) Their staff are rude. The amount of times I've got a mouthful of abuse from
ticket office staff for asking what is going on (when there are no trains and
no information) is ridiculous. They also treat you like a criminal
inconvenience, not a customer.

b) Their info boards are regularly broken. When they do work, they lie. Train
on time? Turns up 10 mins later. Thanks - missed my connecting train. "Sorry
Mrs Gouranga, I'll be home 2 hours later than usual. You'll have to eat dinner
and send the kids to bed before I get in.".

c) Their service is just about as unreliable as it possibly could be. The last
_5 times_ I've had to get on one of their service there has been major
disruption to the point I've said "fuck this shit" and got a taxi, bus or
hobbed it on foot for 6 miles home. The infrastructure is falling to bits as
is the staffing

d) Boiling hot trains. Even the air con services are useless as the air con is
always broken. Armpit city. I'm not joking, it's horrid, even in first class
(if you can call it that). Crazy enough, the train drivers are stupid enough
to leave the train heating on in summer as well.

e) Their ticket machines regularly just pack in to the point there is a queue
out of stations of literally 50-60 people in the mornings. It's actually
better to top up your Oyster card at a local shop before you get to the
station.

It sucks. The article is a typical "feel good about SWT bollocks propaganda".
They can go to hell, Twitter or not.

~~~
andyking
Substitute the words "Northern Rail" for "South West Trains" and you're right
again. The train company up here are well-known for being terrible. The trains
are antique early 1980s sheds, built on a shoestring during a recession and
way past the end of their useful service life.

There are even several Twitter accounts dedicated to documenting the agony of
daily commuting on this awful service: <http://twitter.com/#!/ntfail>

~~~
nicholassmith
Agreed, I get a Northern Rail leg for part of my daily commute and actual
route through Darlington to swap onto an East Coast just to save myself
hassle.

In fairness, they have some nice people working on their Twitter desk, but the
company and service in general is substandard.

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nicholassmith
I was trapped in Newcastle thanks to Britain's tendency to occasionally have
ridiculous weather, @nationalrail became _the_ best source of information
pretty much all the way through until midnight when I finally made it home.
Companies are finally, finally starting to understand how useful it is, and
how much quicker a 140 character tweet can be shared compared to a web site
link.

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apricot13
I find the unnofficial swt staff twitter accounts more helpful. Generally when
there's problems with trains I do a search for a #swt, you get all the info
you need as well as sweary comments from other passengers. Cheers me up
slightly on those days when I can't get home till 11 o'clock.

~~~
gouranga
Great tip - thanks for that :)

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pcowans
Interestingly, some trains (on the London-Cambridge line for example) now have
posters with hashtags for use during delays in the carriages.

