News / SKM and surcharges - Fast Local Trains in Tri-City, Poland [25]

Where to start with this band of unionised jokers?

As part of PKP the SKM is still owned by the state.

skm.pkp.pl/en

As such, some of the employees treat it as their personal plaything, with a lot of "guests" sitting in the front along for the ride. Every train has a "conductor" - whose sole work is to call " All clear", watch the train out of the station and to sell tickets.

Everything that the driver, and ticket machines in the train, could do.

In fact, I suspect that it would not be beyond the realms of modern tech for the trains to be fully automated, but the passenger would not buy into that.

There is a 2 zl 50 surcharge for buying tickets on the train. Today the conductor demanded this fee (more often than not , the train conductor does NOT charge for selling a ticket - which suggests that the charge is in fact at the DISCRETION of the conductor)

Nowhere in the train was it written that the fee was applicable( although it IS established fact) Therefore the charge here is clearly illegal. Anyway - what does the conductor do? His job is redundant, if he is not in fact there to sell tickets.

Further - he is clearly only there because of the 2 zloty 50 gr excess charge and because the unions will not allow the SKM to modernise its' working practices.

When the next train is 30 minutes away and a minus 10 gale is blowing, and the passenger is running to catch the train, why should he be penalised in this manner, when it is perfectly simple to install onboard ticketing?

Now - why should we care?

SKM in the Tri-City has just increased it's prices by more than 5%, and yet they are extremely profitable. The service, though, is well below par, and acts as a monopoly because , since 2002 the traveller can't swop tickets with regional train services.

Summary?

Pure communist era scum.