My Opinion On TFL (Transport in London in general)

Member Name: bhayanid

Product:	Transport in London in general
Date:	10/01/09 (130 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Oyster Card

Disadvantages: Slow Trains, Not Efficient, Rude Service From Some Staff

I feel compelled to write a review on London Underground after finally winning a crown. I have been meaning to write a review on this topic for a while now, as I have a lot to say, so bear with me and I hope you enjoy reading.


If you are looking to travel into London regularly, through work of social reasons, then I am sure you will understand that pretty much the only way to go in is through the use of the tube. For those of you who are not familiar with the system there is basically a wide number of different trains that link together at certain stations, which means it is possible to get from one part of London to another without any walking, just changing trains. Also you can use some of these stations like Kings Cross St Pancras and Victoria station to travel directly to other parts of the country by national express and many other lines.


The problem is that due to the whole transport system being owned by the government they are effectively a monopoly. This means that as customers we are abused and have no choice to pay the increased prices. There were many problems with this in the past as they were increasing prices at a very fast rate. Initially they solved this problem by offering the Oyster card and let me say that I was a very big fan of the oyster card. This allows me to travel with ease as the card just needs to hover above the reader and does not even need to be removed from my wallet. The problem is that with the oyster prices, yes they are lower than the normal prices, but that is due to the normal prices being ridiculously expensive. I am sure the government would say this is due to inflation; however I am not so sure as the rate all the prices are increasing is alarming. Oyster Prices are now £1.10 to travel in the same zone when just a couple of years ago the price was 70p. A normal price is over £3 which is just plain ridiculous. They know that customers, like me, have no choice but to pay this price as it is the only half decent way to travel into London and they can change the prices at will due to their monopoly status.


Also this monopoly status means that they do not have to try hard to satisfy the customers and can keep the train quality as low as they want. For example the tracks used are over seventy years old so around the world war two era. This means that the trains can not go at a decent speed and it takes a good forty minutes for me to travel into London, where as by car it would take around fifteen to twenty minutes. In Germany the trains are much more efficient and trains come within thirty seconds of the stated time, so the customer knows exactly at what point their train will arrive. On top of this the train speed is much much faster than this country and it really is excellent service. In this country some stations do not tell you how long to wait till the next train and at certain points of the day you may find yourself having to wait over thirty minutes for a train. So you can see the difference in efficiency and timing between Germany and London and why the system needs to be drastically changed in the capital of our country.


Now above I did mention that the Oyster was a good service in comparison to the normal ticket buying, and that the prices are cheaper than normal; however I have had an experience which made me reconsider my judgement on the Oyster and the service of the London Underground staff, which is normally excellent. Once when travelling back from Clapham junction I tried to use my Oyster card and it was not functioning. So I went up to the staff at the gate and asked him why it did not work. He promptly swiped my card on his reader and said that I needed to buy prepay. I had no idea what this meant and he just went back to chatting with his colleague, so I politely interrupted him again. He then said I needed to go up to a ticket officer and buy a ticket. Of course I did not want to buy a ticket as this was more expensive then Oyster and I already had enough money on my Oyster card. At this point I was getting pretty frustrated and believe me it takes a lot for me to get flustered. So I went up to him again and was in the middle of explaining the situation and some girl approached to also talk to him and he ignored me and asked her what the problem was. It turned out she had the same problem as me. You will not believe what happened next and I apologize for the use of cap locks but hopefully that will emphasise how I felt at the time. He asked her to stick out his hand, and then he KISSED HER HAND, and let he go through the gate. I really feel like swearing here, but will retain myself from doing so as I am sure it against the Dooyoo conditions, however how can he HAVE THE CHEEK TO DO THAT, and leave me behind, just due to me being male and this service was inexplicable. I really wish I had asked for his name and reported him to the London Underground as this service was DISGUSTING. I was then left trapped on this side of the gate for the next thirty minutes and eventually a staff member came to replace the horrible staff member who served me. Luckily this guy was much more polite and I explained my situation and he let me through. So I hope you can understand how I was annoyed at my oyster card not functioning and disturbed at the service from the London Underground staff and how I was treated by this particular member.


Now let me move onto the Bus service provided. The Bus and Tube service is all operated by the London Underground and the TFL website can be used to view what the best route to take is to get from one destination to another and on average how long this journey would take. Although I will not review the website right now, let me just mention that this site is excellent and I have nothing bad at all to say about it. Too bad about the actual service itself. The Bus service itself is not bad, with many different busses available to take you from one destination to another. It is more convenient for short distance travel, so within a few miles and for this it is good. However like with the trains they are not efficient enough with busses not that frequent and never on schedule. However they do accept Oyster which makes them compatible with trains, but like with trains the prices are always rising and have increased a lot within the last few years.


The bus drivers seem to vary and I can not criticize the TFL on this, as it really does depend on the bus driver himself, or herself, on how friendly they are. What really baffles me though was that the driver has a video camera in his compartment which views the backdoor, which I believe is primarily used to see if anyone, sneaks in through the backdoor without paying. This is frankly a waste of money and yes it would stop some people scamming them, however the government should spend money on more pressing issues, especially with the financial situation affecting everyone.


Overall I have to give the transport for London, two stars, but it could easily have been four if it was not for the few bad experiences I have had. A lot of work does need to be done and I feel a major reconstruction is vital so that the tracks are better which will result in faster more efficient trains and a better service all round for customers.

Summary: There Is Potential If They Improve Certains Aspects To Make This A Good Service