One has the greatest sympathy for rail commuters or regular users of the rail services when faced with the recent price increases. There has been quite a bit of publicity about the increases but on reflection perhaps they are more easily understood than a number of other increases that have received far less publicity and criticism.
The fact is that there is a great deal of investment going on to improve railway services and so there is some form of payback to rail users.
One thinks of two cases in particular, the immense Crossrail project which will bring benefits to thousands who commute to or in London.
Secondly the recent expansion of London Bridge station which will increase capacity to enable almost double the number of passengers to use the station. Just look at the photo below that appears to have been provided by Network Rail and which was taken from the BBC News WEB site to see how impressive that development is:-
One could be excused for thinking that certain other price increases do not seem to be providing those paying the increases with improvements that are lasting.
A good example would be the progressive increases in petrol and diesel fuel prices which probably affect the vast majority of us directly or indirectly such as putting up the cost of goods that have been transported. The writer read, on line, that in 2017 those increases were just less than 5% for Petrol. What improvements did motorists or those travelling on the road receive for that extra money paid out?
Then there are the numerous increases in electricity and gas prices. In the former case is it not reasonable for the consumer to expect that investment in renewables for the production of electricity would start to bring prices down?
However there is one set of increases that leaves all of these in the shade. The writer is referring to the price increases imposed by the Calor company for the supply of Calor Gas Propane Cylinders, on which many living in rural areas with no mains gas rely.
In parts of Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Calor expect users to pay a whopping 17.6% price increase compared to last year if ordering from them and offer a decline in service level which consumers used to enjoy from a local partner from next day delivery to over a week typically.
But wait it gets worse. In an attempt to overcome their appalling service levels Calor offer a solution of buying from a new local partner in some areas. To do so would mean an eye-watering 42.2% price increase!
All of this appears to be caused by Calor’s complete inability to handle the logistics of providing cylinders in a modern efficient manner. So users have to pay far more because the Calor Company will not invest to improve service.
VALE Support Services have provided solutions to such supply challenges with much larger geographical areas being involved and a much bigger product range.
Solutions can include consumables/supplies demand being measured automatically and transmitting back to the main supplies system to automatically place orders, routing optimisation, centralisation of the warehousing and automatic overnight replenishment to local depots and so on.
VALE Support Services have supplied solutions of this nature to a number of multi-nationals amongst others.
Calor you really should talk to us as a matter of urgency and stop penalising your customers.