The TSSA trade union, with 30,000 members in the UK and Ireland working in the transport industry, is not known for militancy and industrial action, yet on January 4th some 200 of its members working in rail industry ticket offices up and down the country were out on their first ever strike and picketing railway stations. A lack of consultation over new machines as well as five stations being told last year they were to lose Travel Centres and also ticket windows was the final straw. Industrial action was on the cards.

Originally, only four stations were planning to take action – Euston, Coventry, Preston and Glasgow. Yet such was the feeling of anger amongst the membership that eventually a dozen stations were involved along the Virgin Trains West Coast Line that serves 25 million passengers a year.

This action has not been taken lightly or easily by TSSA members, but they are at the end of their tether. Many of the members in Coventry, for example, have been in the industry for decades and have built up a rapport with customers by offering the best advice in terms of travelling times and the best ticket prices, a service that they have to provide by law. As rail passenger numbers have increased, the response of Virgin trains has been to cut back on booking office provision so that frustrated passengers are forced to use machines that offer reduced travel options and therefore dole out more expensive tickets. On December 14th, for example, Sky News reported a 30-minute queue some 100 metres long at Coventry station due to an insufficient number of booking office staff.

Passenger experience with the machines has not been good and most tickets bought have been wrong with singles being bought instead of returns or first class instead of standard class being bought. When such mistakes happen the booking office staff have to issue refunds and then advise passengers on the best options. The machines, therefore, rather than making working life easier and more efficient, have added to staff duties. As a Coventry TSSA spokesperson said, The complexity of tickets and variety of cheaper type tickets does take time to unravel and management are only concerned with the first class customer who brings in the most revenue. We have certainly been breaking the Passenger Charters policy of dealing with passenger queuing times and being served in less than 5 minutes during busy times.”

In addition, the company has reduced the times when off peak tickets can be used. Plans are in hand to ban off peak travel into London before 11.30am in the morning and out again before 6.45pm in the evening. At present cheaper travel is allowed after 10.55am and after 6.31pm.

All of these measures by the company are to reduce costs despite the fact that anytime fares went up by 6% last Saturday, car park charges increased by 50% last August and the company is receiving a taxpayer subsidy of £1.4bn over 5 years. As a TSSA press release said about the strike, "This is all about defending a vital service to rail passengers who are already being ripped off with the most expensive fares in Europe.” The union has accused Virgin Trains of cutting back on customer services “to boost their bottom line during the recession” and has stated that it “the economics of the madhouse and it should be stopped and replaced with a public service railway like they have in the rest of Europe."

TSSA wants a commitment to the future of ticket offices by replacing obsolete ticket machines with updated versions so that jobs are protected and customer services maintained. A TSSA member said, "We want all the ticket office machines returned to the Booking Office and Travel Centres because the new ticket machines are not fit for purpose. All they do is frustrate staff members and customers. It is yet another case of money being spent by managers to introduce new technology without consulting those who will use the new technology to see if it is fit for purpose."

TSSA also wants a fair deal for staff so that they are remunerated for using new technology as on-board train staff have been. As was said by a TSSA member, “There is also a sense of inequality between grades and in the case of drivers and other train managers it is blatantly obvious.”

In addition TSSA wants shift cover so that ticket office turns of duty are covered when staff are available to work overtime or rest days and therefore customer service is maintained. When staff had worked their normal working week and were on rest days, they had the choice of extra work if there were shifts that had to be covered because of sickness or annual leave. However, from July to September 2009 the company decided not to cover for these absences in order to save money. This was done with no communication or consultation with the trade union. A TSSA member commented, “The problem could be overcome by filling all vacancies at the stations so we can continue to give excellent service and quality customer care. This obviously means no job losses. The present policy of unfilled vacancies means longer queues, shorter opening hours and customer inconvenience.”

So far Virgin Trains have refused to commit to any of these requests.

From the point of view of Socialist Appeal the dispute raises a number of questions:

1. TSSA booking office staff have been forced into taking strike action by the actions of Virgin Trains whose first duty is not to their staff or the travelling public but to the shareholders and their profits.

2. TSSA booking staff have shown over a long period of time that they want to provide the best possible service to passengers and offer the best ticket prices amongst the myriad of possibilities that the chaos of rail privatisation has caused.

3. TSSA booking staff are the experts in their field and have years of experience in how the rail industry is run, or rather should be run. New technology should be used to make working life easier for all and to provide a better service to passengers, not as an excuse to cut jobs.