Dirty DLR stations

But it should be imo

It's a good topic. We are further along the Beckton DLR line, and our stations have got absolutely filthy on the floor and windows in recent times. Nobody ever seems to wash the floors (mostly concrete) properly, or clean the windows, we have commented how filthy the stations are as well. Where exposed to the weather the natural cleaning effect of rainfall does a bit of cleaning, but under-cover areas are just left untouched. It didn't used to be like this.

This is what you get with outsourced management. It's not just the tasks that are outsourced on the DLR, but the management as well. As Serco's profits skyrocket www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/feb/26/serco-profits the standards go down and down as the management find ways to reinterpret the contract and what is the minimum they can get away with in terms of running the system. Now I know that they will ensure that whatever they have committed to do, they will get done - but not a brushstroke more. No pride in the system. What's the financial return on that?

The only way to overcome it is to send a spurious message that Boris is coming down the Beckton line to see whether outsourcing is working. Then some deep cleaning contractor will be round within hours to clean the place up.

It's penny pinching if the profits are healthy enough. In this instance some custom is lost over time, perhaps enough to wipe out any cost savings. In other instances it can result in poor safety, a familiar story on the railways but most high profile at BP and look how much it's cost them.

Can't be that bad surely, they could probably not clean the station for 10 years and it would still be cleaner than the NYC Subway.

Serco also do a lot of refuse collection and maintenance services etc.

Living near the DLR and using it every day to get to and from places, I do tend to notice the slipping standards...

Something needs to be done about those black gloops of gum that are covering the platforms. Clearly its too hard for someone to come along with a scraper of some kind or a steam cleaner and remove it all?

I might even take a bottle or two of windowlene to my local station and brighten the place up!

I was alighting at Beckton Park last night and the train was being operated at the front. The on-duty guy was accompanied by an off-duty friend on the opposite seat. I couldn't help but overhear their conversation. The latter person was bemoaning the fact that when DLR are in profit it's never credited because it's lumped in with Serco's other profits, but whenever DLR reports a loss, it's highlighted and reported as "DLR's loss" rather than reporting it net with Serco's other operations.

Seems Serco is a company that never congratulates the success of its various business units, but simply "names and shames" those that "aren't performing", i.e. ones that *are* performing but spending more money to do so.

Said person was saying that surely with a company the size of Serco, losses in one part of the business should be offset by other parts.