Southend-2

[asdf1234]

Originally Posted by Expressflight

Then why does the complainant say ".... caused lots of people to miss their flights on 6th March 2019"? Where does your date of 6th April come from?

I'm guessing he mistyped .The skytrax website has his flight taking place in April so it may have been 6th April April and not 6th March .The April date is a Saturday and there may have been an AMS flight on that day .

[willy wombat]

As someone who spent his entire career in commercial aviation, I have watched the recent development of SEN with interest, and also the running comments re security queues. I use Edinburgh quite a lot and the security queues could be awful but of late they seem a lot better. If you look at the Edinburgh Airport App on your iPhone or pad you will see that the first page has a constantly updated security queue time (as I type it's 3 minutes). If I was running an airport this is certainly something I'd do as it keeps the spotlight on the issue. Before posting, rather than look like a muppet, I thought I'd download and check whether the SEN app already had this function only to discover, unless I am mistaken, that there isn't a Southend Airport app. Searching the app store for Southend Airport only brings up an app called Southend Airport Travel which appears to be about a taxi company. If I am wrong I am ready for the barrage of criticism but if I'm right...…..really? - who's running the show? PS in the time it took me to type this the EDI queue time has gone up to 5 minutes.

[southender]

Sadly, IT and Southend Airport do not go hand in hand!

[davidjohnson6]

In 2018, Edinburgh had 10 times the number of passengers compared to Southend.
Is Southend sufficiently large than having an app (instead of just a website) is a priority ?

[SARF]

Originally Posted by Expressflight

The early morning train departs LST at 04:30 (04:35 some days) arriving SIA 05:17 (05:29 some days) calling at Stratford only. No Sunday morning train at present due to engineering works. The late evening train departs SIA at 23:59 arriving LST 00:55 calling at Shenfield and Stratford only. This service operates 7 days a week.

at last ! And it’s a fast train as well. Well as fast as you can get on that line

[willy wombat]

Yee Gods 1/ how do you think EDI got so busy? 2/ an app is no big deal. As I pointed out above, a Southend taxi company has got an app. 3/ many of the sort of travellers you get on EZY and FR live on their phones. Even I, as a (recent) OAP sometimes use a mobile boarding card on my iPhone. Decent website and app is vital.

[SWBKCB]

And SEN, as a new entrant with a clean sheet, should be looking to be ahead of the game. They give the impression that they're struggling to keep up.

[SARF]

I never travel anywhere without a paper boarding pass. Mind you I just bought a round using c a s h. ....

[tayair6]

Andrew Tinkler loses appeal over Stobart Group High Court case.

[DC3 Dave]

Originally Posted by Expressflight

Early and late trains

Good news. The early and late trains are now timetabled to start from next Monday, 10th June.

Some local publicity for the trains plus website has been updated. Still nothing about the new coach service.

https://www.echo-news.co.uk/news/176...-extra-trains/

[BA318]

Originally Posted by DC3 Dave

Some local publicity for the trains plus website has been updated. Still nothing about the new coach service.

https://www.echo-news.co.uk/news/176...-extra-trains/

I've had adverts for the new coach service on Facebook - I assume they are targeted as I live quite close to Canning Town station in Royal Docks area.

[tws123]

The EnsignBus JetLink coach service has been suspended because Southend Airport have denied them access apparently! How bizarre

From Twitter it said

It is with great regret that we have to announce the withdrawal of JETLINK X1 London • Southend Airport until further notice. This is due to Southend Airport denying us access to the airport

[LTNman]

Stobart would be looking for a fee no doubt. Same thing happened at Luton. Greenline took the airport to court as they were banned after 40 odd years as Luton had done an exclusive deal with National Express which was deemed illegal.

[Planespeaking]

Originally Posted by LTNman

Stobart would be looking for a fee no doubt. Same thing happened at Luton. Greenline took the airport to court as they were banned after 40 odd years as Luton had done an exclusive deal with National Express which was deemed illegal.

At least LTN had 40 years, I don't think this service has even started at SEN. It could be because of the new early and late train services being introduced now to SEN, however it an example of how not to handle PR. Well done Stobart!!

[DC3 Dave]

Originally Posted by Planespeaking

At least LTN had 40 years, I don't think this service has even started at SEN. It could be because of the new early and late train services being introduced now to SEN, however it an example of how not to handle PR. Well done Stobart!!

I didn't really agree with your PR comments, because there had been so little publicity about this service in the first place. That was until.......

https://www.echo-news.co.uk/news/177...-try-to-board/

My understanding is that Stobart get a substantial cut from every ticket sold from the railway station, which is fair enough as they paid for it. Does anyone know the percentage?

[LTNman]

This is a great example of Stobart putting themselves first before their passengers and refusing to see the bigger picture which could cost them passengers. London Victoria coach and railway station is the other side of London and would complement the new early rail journey with an additional starting point.

With the first train now arriving one hour before the first wave of departures and with the airport telling passengers to arrive at the airport 2 hours before departure the coach company makes a good point. I would not use the train after reading about all the passengers who are missing their flights due to terminal queues if I had a 6:30 departure.

It is a sad state of affairs that the airport is not coach friendly as they want to control everything at Southend. I wonder if Stobart knows that when the airport reaches 2 million passengers they will be forced to open up the airport to outside handling agents.

[davidjohnson6]

Turnover does not equal profit... and right now I imagine Stobart are desperate to extract profit out of the airport by any means possible.

[rocker6346]

So the SEN-ANR line will be cancelled as of Sept 1. Not that it was such a busy route anyway...

[davidjohnson6]

Is the new startup airline called Air Antwerp close to being able to put seats on sale or is that still a long way off ?

[DC3 Dave]

Originally Posted by DC3 Dave

My understanding is that Stobart get a substantial cut from every ticket sold from the railway station, which is fair enough as they paid for it. Does anyone know the percentage?

I have extracted a paragraph from some correspondence I found online. It dates from September 2015, but the arrangement described probably holds good today.

SRL = Stobart Rail Limited.

"19. The charging arrangements in place allow SRL to retain 91% of all ticket sales to
and from the station, less season ticket sales. The arrangements also include
review mechanisms (see also paragraph 29) that may be instigated by either party
to the SAA. The access charge provisions set out in the Stobart SACs also permit a
review to be called at any time where any stated assumptions which underpin the
revenue sharing principles in the Stobart SACs cease to be correct."

So you can see why Stobart wouldn't be too keen on a competitive coach service running along a similar route to the railway.