The Doctor has been to London for a few days, and got the opportunity to travel on one of GWR's much trumpeted IEP trains.
Ghastly - and all because of their pathetic management.
Going up to town, I arrived at my local station with my seat reservation. The signs said it was travelling in reverse formation, and first class would be at the rear ... but of which unit - the front one, or the rear one? The platform staff did not know, and they told me they were frustrated at not knowing the train formations. (In the Continent, of course, this sort of thing is second nature).
I got on board after guessing where the carriage might stop. No seat reservations were on the seats. Scrum.
I went to the WC - after committing myself (as it were), I discovered too late that there was no loo roll; no water, no drier and no towels. I had no alternative but to dry my hands on the upholstery of the new deeply (wrong word - they're not deep) unpleasant seats.
Coming back from town - the same sort of thing: I entered my coach to find no seat reservations were indicated. There was some real anger amongst people fighting for seats they thought were theirs. I asked the 'train manager' (joke, surely - manager of what?) what was up with the reservation system. He said it was uploaded correctly, but he didn't know they weren't being displayed - for goodness sake, was he not supposed to check these things? Too busy managing, I suppose.
Great Western (ex 'First' Great Western) have spent a fortune on publicity for this wretched service - and they clearly can't yet deliver it properly. This is crass management of a privatised company that is excellent at self-publicity; excellent at protecting its revenue - yet piss-poor at being able to deliver its service properly.
