Bosses pick BlackBerrys for guards

Conductor Steven Lewis using his new Blackberry handset in York

Train guards who kept passengers informed with mobile phone text messages from their controllers have been given “smart phones” — beloved of city high fliers — to keep Rochdale rail travellers up to date by email instead.

Operator Northern Rail is providing the famous BlackBerry pocket computers to more than 1,000 conductors on its network which serves Greater Manchester.

Northern is the first train operator in the country to issue BlackBerries to all its conductors. The £140,000 investment means they will get more and better quality information about any current services, including delays, connections at stations, and planned engineering works.

Northern’s managing director Heidi Mottram said: “Our customers are increasingly satisfied with the overall service that we provide but they would like more information, particularly during disruption.

“We have listened to their feedback and providing BlackBerries to all our conductors will help to keep people informed.

“We have achieved a big increase in the number of our trains that arrive on time but, when there are delays, customers really want to know what is happening and that is where the BlackBerries will be a big help.”

The smart phones have replaced a system in which Northern’s operations control centre sent messages to conductors using mobile phones and text messages, which restricted the amount of information that could be sent.

Now, the controllers can send messages by email and, because there is no restriction on the length of the message, this means all the information they need is sent in a single message.

The BlackBerry phones also have internet access to live departure boards, which means conductors can provide passengers with up-to-date information about onward connections and allow conductors to send detailed information back to the control centre.