So after writing about thetrainline.com over here, I received a comment on the post telling me they were looking into it and would respond 'in the next 24-48 hours.' I've just got their email, some 167 hours after the comment was posted. The delay was due to 'intermittent email issues.'
I'll precis what was in the email:
1) The problems with the system offering me trains that were fully booked is because they feed off the National Reservation System, and it can be three hours old. All other booking sites feed off this too.
2) The helpful error notice (Error E00328) is for their benefit, so they can figure out what my problem is quickly.
That's kind of it. They neglected to mention this other stuff that I also talked about: Why am I paying a booking fee? Why did they neglect to mention the £2.50 credit card fee? Why can't I add in the promotional code on the payment page to save me re-entering the same info again?
This bit confused me: "The telephone number (0870 010 1296) displayed with the error message and on our contact page is correct, however on Friday we had a problem with our telephony system for 40minutes, therefore callers to this number during this period would have been directed to another number, so we’re sorry this happened."
For starters, I called them on a Monday, not a Friday. How is this pertinent to me? Secondly, it does nothing to address the issue that I'm still paying for the call every time I call them to give them money for a ticket. Money from me for my ticket, money from me for the booking fee, money from me for the credit card fee, and money from me when I call to pay for the above.
Now that I've addressed my personal issues we should crack on with the marketing stuff... oh come on, you know that's why you like coming here!
All the trainline.com have succeeded in doing is making a statement of what their stance is and what went wrong with my visit to them. Granted they said sorry, but that's not enough most of the time and it's definitely not enough when there's a recession on and you're a middle-man with nothing extra to offer than going direct to the product.
They told me why some things don't work as seamlesssly as we'd like, but they've made no mention about how they're going to improve the system. So we can assume that the problems I had could happen next time. If that's the case, why would I go back if I felt compelled to write a negative blog post after my last experience?
There was not a single question mark in the email. A simple thing really, but a question mark means they want my reply. My reply to their email means a conversation. Their email with no question marks means a statement and they're not inviting my input. So why we were all having a conversation about it, they're not bothered about joining in. They've said their bit, and that's the end of it. Not a sensible move, thetrainline.com. You know when you're telling a child something they don't want to hear and they put their fingers in their ears and shout "I can't hear you! I can't hear you!"...
When will brands realise that people offering views and experiences in public is a great opportunity to learn something about your brand and to turn a negative experience into a positive one? Talk to me, not at me.
So there we go. I'm a Northerner living down south. I have family in the North East, I have a season ticket to Newcastle United and you know what? I don't have a car. That means I use trains a lot. Solely for that reason I feel compelled to write: thetrainline.com as a website - FAIL. Feeling like a valued friend of thetrainline.com - FAIL
