South Western Railway is proposing to close ‘ticket office windows’ at all their stations, with staff moving to other station areas, where they are “better placed to help customers buy tickets, provide expert travel advice, information and assistance for customers”.
SWR explain that customers will still be able to access the same products and services as they do today, through South Western Railway’s Website, their mobile App, contactless payment, pay as you go, at their customer contact centre, or at stations.
Island impact
See below for more detail, but in summary, the plan for Island Line is just for the ticket office windows to close in Ryde and Shanklin, rather than the entire ticket office area.
Staff would be moved out into the ticket office areas to support other staff and customers using the ticket vending machines and purchasing tickets online.
Three-week consultation
The consultation, which closes on 26th July, sets out the proposed changes, explaining that the modernisation will see staff at stations transition to new multi-skilled roles “with a clear focus on helping customers”.
Island Line will be impacted as set out below.
Category 1: Ryde
The newly rebuilt Ryde Esplanade station will be staffed from 6am to 7pm seven days a week. It is currently staffed from 5.25am-7pm on weekdays, 6.10am-5.15pm on Saturdays and 7.30am-6pm on Sundays.
Ryde Esplanade, as a Category 1 station, will maintain full retailing capability to sell every type of ticket that is currently sold in ticket offices, with SWR staff with enhanced retail knowledge able to help customers, as well as every staff member working at the station being upskilled to provide retail support to customers.
What SWR say,
At category 1 stations, there will be multiple South Western Railway colleagues available to help customers every day of the week. The locations of category 1 stations ensure that our customers are never too far from a location where a ticket can be purchased from interim additional retailing facilities, while the industry fully transitions to digital ticketing. Roughly eighty per cent of customer journeys are through a category 1 station.
Offering an enhanced retailing capability at these stations will help us to maintain our service to customers as the industry fully transitions to digital ticketing. At these stations, customers will be able to buy standard walk up tickets, all season tickets, warrants and rail vouchers, buy and replace Railcards, and get ticket refunds.
Category 1 stations will have interim additional retailing facilities that will be able to provide the ticket types that customers are unable to purchase online or via ticket vending machines.
Category 3: Shanklin
Shanklin station (Category 3) would be unstaffed on Sunday and Monday, staffed from 6am-10pm on Tuesday-Friday and then 9am-1pm.
What SWR say,
Category 3 stations have been selected to have at least one colleague available at set times. Most journeys from these stations are already made using tickets purchased through digital channels or via ticket vending machines.
The colleague at a category 3 station will be multi-skilled and able to support customers to buy tickets using digital channels and ticket vending machines, plan their journeys, answer any queries and more. South Western Railway will have colleagues available at alternate stations on Mondays to Saturdays or Tuesdays to Sundays to ensure customers are never too far from a station with retail support.
South Western Railway is also investing in video-calling capabilities on ticket vending machines at 91 locations, mostly at category 3 stations. This move will allow customers to see and interact with a colleague at our video call centre. This service will provide additional support at these stations for the majority of the day, when there are no colleagues physically present. At these stations, customers will be able to buy standard walk up tickets, monthly and weekly season tickets, and Railcards.
Category 4: All others
All other stations, which would be Category 4, will be unstaffed.
What SWR say,
What a category 4 would look and feel like in practice:
A case study of Smallbrook station As is already the case, a customer travelling from Smallbrook station would purchase tickets online or at a ticket vending machine. For ticket types that cannot be purchased at Smallbrook station, the customer would need to buy the ticket online or at one of South Western Railway’s category 1 stations.Ahead of implementation there will be a way for customers to buy a ticket that allows them to get to a category 1 station to purchase the ticket they require for their journey without being out of pocket. South Western Railway will develop the specifics of what this will look like by working with passenger groups.
Have your say
To respond to the consultation (deadline Wednesday 26th July 2023) email: [email protected].
Alternatively you can write to Freepost: RTEH-XAGE-BYKZ, Transport Focus, PO Box 5594, Southend on Sea SS1 9PZ.
For more information about how to have your say visit the Transport Focus Website.
The consultation document can be found below, embedded for your convenience.
Image: © Google Maps/Streetview
