Michael Byrne

Said the following about Wigan North Western Station Team:

“I am nominating this fantastic team as every single day they deliver for our customers, other train operating companies that serve Wigan and Virgin Trains.

I took over at Wigan 17 months ago and what I have seen during that time has lead me to put the team forward for team of the year. During the last 12 months alone the team have made 12 lifesaving suicide interventions which not only shows great skills when spotting vulnerable people but incredible resilience to bounce back and deliver excellent customer service skills day after day, which has won one of the life saver award courtesy of the British Transport Police.

The team has amazing strength and humour which shows daily when they are interacting with the customers and each other. They consistently hit company set targets, recently the retail team was tasked with reducing the amount of paper ticket we sell and to try and get our customers to switch over to digital tickets, they are regularly near the top of the list for stand out Stations within our Virgin Trains group and have embraced mobile ticketing.

Our Station team has worked hard to drive down train running delays that help keep our trains within plan and this helps with helping our customers when making connections to be at their destination n time by managing their platforms and spotting hazards that arise. They have gone from 15th place within the company nationally moving and moved up to 5th place for overall delays which is a massive jump within a twelve month period, especially with our customer base increasing by 16% since the last timetable change in May last year.

Wigan sits within a city centre location which bring its own problems not to mention the flow of stag & hen parties that pass through for Liverpool & Manchester. They are a fantastic bunch of people that deserve to recognized nationally, come and see for yourself maybe even sample he local delicacy a Wigan kebab!“