Ride Availability/Operations 2022-24

[BarryZola]

Merlin are usually making around 200-300 million quid a year in operating profit (it was over 300 last year). They can afford to have the correct number of tech staff and pay them properly, but the evidence of recent years suggests that they would rather not and instead keep an extra couple of million quid or whatever on the balance sheet. This, at the expense of a better guest experience. It's not asking a lot to have sufficient people to look after your machines when your business relies on machines working to entertain guests. They really need to have a good look at operating budgets again, especially in tech services and maintenance. They'll still clear hundreds of million in profit. It's just penny-pinching.

 

[Alsty]

Absolutely no chance it would happen and I wouldn’t want it, but it would be some sort of incentive to keep rides open. Soemthing which seems to currently be missing at the moment. Not sure if they offer a bonus for uptime but they’ve had a lot of pay disagreements at Chessington, can’t imagine it’s any different at Alton.

This is a bad idea. In the report into The Smiler incident, it described how technical services staff had bonuses linked to minimum levels of downtime. There were also clocks in the operators cabin which showed how long the ride had been down. Both of these put additional pressure on the staff to get the ride open again quickly. I would imagine both of these things have (quite rightly) been scrapped. Management probably still analyse the downtime data offline to look for trends but without linking it to any employees.

The actual solution is to have enough technical staff to perform all of the required maintenance, including preventative, and available to sign-off rides in the mornings. It feels like the technical resource is thinly stretched. Good pay, benefits and working conditions could also be factors, linked to morale and staff retention.

 

[AT86]

A look at the current job vacancies does suggest they are struggling to fill roles for tech services. The oldest job posting is for an engineer and dates back to August.

I imagine the pay is the biggest problem. I know they tout the Magic Pass as a huge perk, but 20 free tickets doesn’t really make up for the thousands less in salary, long hours and working outside in all weathers.

https://merlin.csod.com/ux/ats/careersite/4/home?c=merlin&cfdd%5B0%5D%5Bid%5D=21&cfdd%5B0%5D%5Boptions%5D%5B0%5D=249&lang=en-GB

 

[Tom]

I think the recent academy announcement/structure is designed to bring more people in from an in-house base rather than relying on external recruitment. Start people on minimum wage and give them structured rises, but in reality bring the net wage bill for engineering/technical down. Seems designed to take more influence away from the unions following recent disputes in my view. The long-term effects on reliability could be a positive, but could be a very long lead time if it does work.

 

[RIPCorky]

This is a bad idea. In the report into The Smiler incident, it described how technical services staff had bonuses linked to minimum levels of downtime. There were also clocks in the operators cabin which showed how long the ride had been down. Both of these put additional pressure on the staff to get the ride open again quickly. I would imagine both of these things have (quite rightly) been scrapped. Management probably still analyse the downtime data offline to look for trends but without linking it to any employees.

The actual solution is to have enough technical staff to perform all of the required maintenance, including preventative, and available to sign-off rides in the mornings. It feels like the technical resource is thinly stretched. Good pay, benefits and working conditions could also be factors, linked to morale and staff retention.

Sorry but you can't really blame the crash on that. Every single ride crew and the maintenance team will be told to get the ride open as soon as possible with minimum downtime.

 

[Ethan]

A look at the current job vacancies does suggest they are struggling to fill roles for tech services. The oldest job posting is for an engineer and dates back to August.

I imagine the pay is the biggest problem. I know they tout the Magic Pass as a huge perk, but 20 free tickets doesn’t really make up for the thousands less in salary, long hours and working outside in all weathers.

https://merlin.csod.com/ux/ats/careersite/4/home?c=merlin&cfdd%5B0%5D%5Bid%5D=21&cfdd%5B0%5D%5Boptions%5D%5B0%5D=249&lang=en-GB

Is there a reason why towers don't pay well? The park make millions and millions surely they can pay staff a bit more if necessary

 

[GooseOnTheLoose]

Is there a reason why towers don't pay well? The park make millions and millions surely they can pay staff a bit more if necessary

Capitalism.

They may have a high turnover of staff, and staff may not be happy, but they regularly fill the positions enough to not warrant a pay bump.

Let them eat brioche.

 

[Alsty]

Sorry but you can't really blame the crash on that. Every single ride crew and the maintenance team will be told to get the ride open as soon as possible with minimum downtime.

Did I blame the crash on that? It wasn't the cause but is something that was identified in the report. Time pressure was being felt by the staff involved.

Even pushing the ride hosts to get high throughputs is controversial these days.

 

[Craig]

I don't want to drag this too much into Smiler discussion, but as Alsty pointed out, incentivising getting rides up and running by way of bonuses and targets was raised in the expert's report which was written for the HSE's case against Merlin. This is summarised in this BBC article:

During the prosecution, Mr Thorogood made repeated reference to an expert report compiled by Stephen Flanagan, who inspected rides for the HSE.
Parts of the report which were not read in court said management had set targets for downtime on rides "with bonuses linked to achieving acceptably low levels".
One of the engineers "felt pressure" to get the ride "quickly back into service" shortly before the crash, the report said.

There's also a lot in the report about having more detailed processes after breakdowns, as many of the steps were just a formality at the time - for example a quick phone call to control to put the ride into code zero rather than physical attendance. There's also lots on working practices and formal training on certain aspects which can be read in the full reports.

So yes, The Smiler incident and the changes brought after it does undoubtedly play a contributing factor in the time it takes for rides to be brought back to being operational. Due to the increased training now required, it's no doubt also contributing to any new tech services employees being able to work on some rides while they get up to speed with processes and procedures.

Obviously there's plenty more going on in the background that's causing the current problems, but we shouldn't underestimate the impact that incident had on how the park now operates.

 

[Tom]

While the Smiler may have had an effect, as Craig suggests, nothing is an excuse for not running the place properly. Staff now have bonuses, or at least targets, for guests to get on as many rides as possible in their day, so the appropriate KPI is still there.

Who, if anyone:

• Ensures an appropriate level of spare parts are held on stock - regardless of procurement issues, this needs to be risk assessed as a vulnerability.
• Collects, analyses and acts on data for downtime & failures, and implements preventative actions.

I'm more confident of what roles look at staff numbers. organisational design and remuneration. There seems to be clear flaws with staff resource and/or competence that have not been addressed.

 

[Bowser]

Is the reliability that much worse than 20 years ago? I can remember getting a ticket to enter via the exit after something closed down back then, but I'd probably waited two hours or more. I don't then recall issues with redeeming them.

Visiting the parks in my youth (1990's) i never remember waiting more than an hour for anything. You'd always get a ride on everything you wanted and a repeat ride if desired. We always visited on the busiest peak days but there was still time to go back to the car to get lunch! The only thing i remember being broken at times was Thunder Looper. Perhaps i benefitted from the fact that most rides at this time were newish (or younger than 10 years) and generally less complex.

Although caveat that i may be misremembering due to the passage of time, that queues pass quicker when you're with groups of people and that there were no timing indicators.

 

[Dave]

Completely forgot that Merlin don't actually own their parks. Do they own the ride hardware, pre-estate sale? A stadium can always get another football team in, I suppose. Who else would take on a lease of Alton Towers, apart from Merlin? It's an awkward bugger of a situation and I'm really surprised that they ever went for it.

I know it was a leveraged buy out, so that they could finance the Merlin buyout of Tussaud's in the first place, but you've got to wonder what they were actually buying at that point.

Merlin own the ride hardware, they don’t own the freehold of the land. It was effectively a massive guaranteed loan. They can’t be kicked off and they have to have 1st refusal for each lease renewal.

Merlin are usually making around 200-300 million quid a year in operating profit (it was over 300 last year). They can afford to have the correct number of tech staff and pay them properly, but the evidence of recent years suggests that they would rather not and instead keep an extra couple of million quid or whatever on the balance sheet. This, at the expense of a better guest experience. It's not asking a lot to have sufficient people to look after your machines when your business relies on machines working to entertain guests. They really need to have a good look at operating budgets again, especially in tech services and maintenance. They'll still clear hundreds of million in profit. It's just penny-pinching.

Previously the profit went to shareholders, that is why a lot of companies are lowering quality as the priority is share holders. The issue recently now it’s back in private hands is likely to be paying off the loan to purchase and any debts accrued during Covid.

Is there a reason why towers don't pay well? The park make millions and millions surely they can pay staff a bit more if necessary

I believe they are starting to but the economy is so on edge for luxury products like leisure that I doubt they will go up much as the risk is higher. Im not justifying that decision but that will be the reason.

 

[jon81uk]

Visiting the parks in my youth (1990's) i never remember waiting more than an hour for anything. You'd always get a ride on everything you wanted and a repeat ride if desired. We always visited on the busiest peak days but there was still time to go back to the car to get lunch! The only thing i remember being broken at times was Thunder Looper. Perhaps i benefitted from the fact that most rides at this time were newish (or younger than 10 years) and generally less complex.

I can remember Nemesis and Oblivion getting 2+ hour queues, although with no fast track they would have moved quicker and had more people in the queue. Visiting in the early 90s we certainly wouldn’t have time to get in the monorail and all the way back to the car for lunch and back to the park and still get everything done. I started visiting regularly in the early 2000s and waiting multiple hours for Air. Things were managed better, but the headline coasters have often had two hour queues forever.

 

[Poisson]

Getting spares isn't as simple as that. They are a cost that can't be easily written off and spares are seen as wasted capital sat doing nothing. It's a horrifically silly approach but this is how it works.

 

[rob666]

I recall two or three hour queues for the new rides, and often two hours for the flume/rapids on summer days.
But yes, an hour for the rest at most, often less, and a decade or two of walk ons in low season...that is what I miss.

 

[Tom]

Getting spares isn't as simple as that. They are a cost that can't be easily written off and spares are seen as wasted capital sat doing nothing. It's a horrifically silly approach but this is how it works.

It’s simple if you place sufficient value on contingency and reliability.

 

[GooseOnTheLoose]

It’s simple if you place sufficient value on contingency and reliability.

How many spare tyres do you have, or generally how many spare bits for your car? How many spare internal components do you have for your phone or laptop? How many spare parts do you have for your washing machine, or oven? How many spare parts do you have for every single piece of technology or machinery that you rely on daily? I'm presuming that you place sufficient value on contingency and reliability.

We expect everything to work all of the time. We have no idea what is going to go wrong on complex machines, or simple technology. Heck, how many spare lightbulbs or batteries do we have kicking about? We know that things can go wrong, but we can't predict when or what. When you're accounting for a massive complex piece of machinery, you can't have spares for everything (or even really the essentials). You'll have spares for the consumables, the bits that are designed to wear out, but not the bits that aren't.

As @Poisson said, it's not easy to write spares off financially. You've got to account for every penny spent. You can't expense it until it's actually in use, or you've got to account for how you know you're going to need it. Every purchase needs to be justified and not everything can be predicted.

There will also be high level service agreements for the rides. Certain parts will be covered by different companies. A lot of these pieces are built to order, so even logistically it's not really possible, let alone financially.

 

[jmc]

I have been multiple times this year and all of the issues have never been more noticeable. There hasn’t been a single visit without:-

- several rides not being available at opening resulting in wandering around looking for something to do
- monstrous queue times
- main queues moving at painfully slow rate (lack of care re ops? Oversold FT? Out of control RAP? All of the above?)
- rides up and down like a yoyo

Sometimes I wonder if I just pick up on these things because I have been so many times, but judging by the increasingly dreadful Tripadvisor reviews, these issues really seem to have reached boiling point.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Pro

 

[Tom]

How many spare tyres do you have, or generally how many spare bits for your car? How many spare internal components do you have for your phone or laptop? How many spare parts do you have for your washing machine, or oven? How many spare parts do you have for every single piece of technology or machinery that you rely on daily? I'm presuming that you place sufficient value on contingency and reliability.

We expect everything to work all of the time. We have no idea what is going to go wrong on complex machines, or simple technology. Heck, how many spare lightbulbs or batteries do we have kicking about? We know that things can go wrong, but we can't predict when or what. When you're accounting for a massive complex piece of machinery, you can't have spares for everything (or even really the essentials). You'll have spares for the consumables, the bits that are designed to wear out, but not the bits that aren't.

As @Poisson said, it's not easy to write spares off financially. You've got to account for every penny spent. You can't expense it until it's actually in use, or you've got to account for how you know you're going to need it. Every purchase needs to be justified and not everything can be predicted.

There will also be high level service agreements for the rides. Certain parts will be covered by different companies. A lot of these pieces are built to order, so even logistically it's not really possible, let alone financially.

None of those things you mention have ever let me down, nor do I have the capacity to fit them even if I held the parts. I understand the point you are trying to make, but don't see it as a comparable issue. If you're experiencing repeated failures, then you take action to correct - unless you have calculated that the P-off factor to your customers is acceptable versus the cost of risk mitigation. They may well have come to this conclusion, but it's likely a conscious act rather than solely being factors outside of their control.

And a reminder that my argument was two fold, as I also see there being significant evidence of technical staff deficiencies (in terms of numbers and/or competencies).

 

[Poisson]

I agree they should have more spares, but in a company that has been penny pinching, it is unsurprising. Some of the departments at work have the same issue as management can't see past the here and now.