Peer review: Anthony Smith
Chief Executive, Passenger Focus
Making more data and information available to passengers will enable them to make more informed choices. Greater transparency is most important for train performance, because getting to their destination on time is what passengers ‘buy’ when they purchase their ticket. Train companies must do more to make themselves accountable to passengers for providing this service, so making more useful data available is key.
Passenger Focus’ objective is for the rail industry to become more transparent - we push industry bodies to release their own data, and to publish information to meet demand. We opened up our own data, creating a ‘data explorer’ for our complaints and National Rail Passenger Survey results that allows passengers to explore satisfaction with train companies over time.
We recommend far greater transparency of information relevant to passenger experience. This is not only right in principle, given that passengers and taxpayers fund the railway, it is also key to building trust between a train company and its customers.
Although there is already some performance information in the public domain, there is more to be done. We believe it is entirely reasonable for passengers to expect to be able to find out about the performance of their specific train service on the train company website - which isn’t always the case. This needs to change.
Until passengers can easily see data for the particular trains they use, for example a commuter who only ever uses the 0723 and the 1719 in and out of London, the accusation will remain that the rail industry is hiding the truth within an average that is not representative of an individual’s experience.
This kind of disaggregated performance information is already available to passengers via third party websites. However, what is needed to develop real trust among passengers and stakeholders is a genuine ‘nothing to hide’ culture. This is about being (and being seen to be) open and honest about the track record in service delivery. It is about not expecting valued customers to have to submit a Freedom of Information request or to search for a website that uses Network Rail’s open data feeds.
Train companies need to provide access to historic data that can be searched in a variety of different ways. Ultimately, a passenger should be able to see the performance of their trains to whatever parameter they wish, including ‘right-time’ and between any pair of stations, not just the final destination of the train.
Giving rail passengers access to performance figures relevant to their services will no doubt give some passengers tools that help them hold their train company to account more effectively than they can at present. We regard that as a good thing, that good managers should not feel threatened by. Indeed, transparency may help drive improvement - for example, poor punctuality at intermediate stations may prompt work on a solution to a problem previously only visible to passengers. Passengers would also welcome greater transparency about crowding. Research by the Office of Rail Regulation found that passengers not only wanted more information, but acted upon it when planning their journeys.
We recommend the adoption of an open and honest culture, making data and information available to passengers, to help to build trust between train companies and their passengers.
