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CRT Employees attitude


canalboat

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Is there anyone else out there who has noticed a general decline recently in rudeness and sheer laziness of CRT employees out on the canal.   Have they all been sent on a mandatory tea-drinking and skiving course or is it an understandable, if not acceptable reaction to more and more volunteers?  Put that together with the increase in Chuggers scaring people away from popular bits of tow path and I wonder what direction the management have decided to impose.

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There used to be a time when the employees took great pride in "their" stretch of canal, were generally very helpful and understood what boating is about.

It is quite clear that they have become very demotivated by the attitude of CRT's management, particularly after the last raft of regional manager recruitment.

It is not surprising, when you see the management behaving as though they couldn't care a toss about boaters, or the preservation of the unique structure of Britain's waterways.

There are a few exceptions, but I do wonder where it is all going with the attitude of the current CRT management.

2 minutes ago, Alan de Enfield said:

Isn't that a good thing ?

I wondered about that, but after reading the rest of the post, I think it is the opposite of what the OP meant.

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2 minutes ago, dor said:

There used to be a time when the employees took great pride in "their" stretch of canal, were generally very helpful and understood what boating is about.

It is quite clear that they have become very demotivated by the attitude of CRT's management, particularly after the last raft of regional manager recruitment.

It is not surprising, when you see the management behaving as though they couldn't care a toss about boaters, or the preservation of the unique structure of Britain's waterways.

There are a few exceptions, but I do wonder where it is all going with the attitude of the current CRT management.

I wondered about that, but after reading the rest of the post, I think it is the opposite of what the OP meant.

I think it is not what he wanted to say. but it is what he said.

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When I reported the knackered stop lock on the Macc (damaged by a boater, mind you, not a CRT employee) it was fixed within hours by a cheerful couple of guys, who also checked and improved various other bits of it. 

Last one I saw down there had just walked a mile down from the workboat (with tools) as someone had said the byewash was blocked. Generally I've always found them, and BW before, to be pretty dedicated. The problems are higher up, not with yer actual workers, and always have been. 

And, anyone doing hard physical work out of doors needs the odd break and a cup tea and a chat. I guess the OP has never done any (assuming that he was trying to denigrate CRT employees, which as has been pointed out, he actually failed to do). 

Edited by Arthur Marshall
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9 minutes ago, sharpness said:

I've never encountered a rude BW/CRT employee in 18 years & I don't think I've ever been aware of an obviously lazy one either. Has something happened to provoke the OPs feelings I wonder?

Me neither 

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3 hours ago, catweasel said:

Can't say I have seen a huge difference from BW days. Some of them could be a real PITA. 

In fairness Stan we can all be a PITA. I am a pro at it :D i dont see much difference myself of late of CART staff?

Edited by mrsmelly
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3 minutes ago, PaulJ said:

Sorry Canalboat. I have only found C&RT chaps (and chapesses) helpful and in the main cheery. Subbies that are working for C&RT are a different kettle of fish though-you are not confusing them by any chance?

This^

 

contractors round here are awful, Rothen Group I believe. Had one scrape his hopper all the way down the side of our boat on a dead straight bit of wide canal, not another boat to be seen and he was going a fair pace as well. When we objected to this the teenage steerer asked my OH if he “wanted to make something of it?!” 

 

So we did. We rang them and crt and kicked up a right old stink! 

 

This was 2 years ago on the north Oxford. Thankfully the guy that seems to drive their boats past us on the Ashby is rather more experienced, and nicer.. ?

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4 hours ago, canalboat said:

Is there anyone else out there who has noticed a general decline recently in rudeness and sheer laziness of CRT employees out on the canal.   Have they all been sent on a mandatory tea-drinking and skiving course or is it an understandable, if not acceptable reaction to more and more volunteers?  Put that together with the increase in Chuggers scaring people away from popular bits of tow path and I wonder what direction the management have decided to impose.

Not at all. In fact the ones I met last week were very friendly, helpful and well informed.
Perhaps it is your attitude to them.

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The CRT chap that came out to us at about 8.30 pm on Monday evening when we were stuck half way down the Rochdale 9 was very helpful, and got us on our way again. We liked his cheerful manner and his willingness to get the problem sorted. We also appreciate that CRT have such people available to help out and solve problems, and not just during normal working hours. 

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Just coming to the end of a month on Oxford, Coventry, T&M, Macclesfield, Peak Forest, Shroppie, Staffs & Worcester. Encountered no problems and all crt people we met were helpful & friendly. Particularly impressed by cleanliness of most wc facilities at sanitary stations. 

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Helpful, yes. more of them apparently so, if you count all the fund raisers and volunteers. There is the Wellbeing aspect of the Trust, to remember.

 

Bur here is a thought, the Nationalisation of the waterways network was by act of Parliament,  but I have noticed the order that led to their establishment and granted them specific powers in June 2012 was simply that. There has been no act as far as I can see. This state of affair has given everybody access to the towpath and also forged a measure of protection for disused waterways, bur as to their desire for developing freight on their network, this appears to have less urgency.

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I recent times times the attitude of C&RT employees and volunteers has been more than acceptably  professional.

The volunteer lock keepers on the non tidal locks  used to make mistakes but they have learned their skills. 

One or two inexperienced employees have been put on tidal  lock duty.  But it's not their fault if they have not been properly trained.

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Like many others it seems, my impression of CRT staff has been very positive (nine times out of ten, anyway). Somebody has mentioned a 'can do' attitude, which sounds about right to me. Over the years I've not only had all sorts of timely help from staff in terms of letting water down, operating a problematic lock etc., but several instances of 'above and beyond' assistance such as fetching us a can of petrol when we ran out, a bottle of gas another time, even an area manager driving to our boat to return a set of keys left in the services block. 

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