September 12, 2018 – Hartford
ADA PARTICIPATION GROUP FORUM
Wednesday, September 12, 2018
If you experience an issue with the ADA Paratransit service that requires investigation, please do not hesitate to contact the Customer Service Department at (860) 724-5340 extension 9, Monday through Friday, 8:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m., email Hartford.Customerservice@firstgroup.com, or fax (860) 936-3750. You may also write to: Customer Service Department c/o First Transit, 148 Roberts St, East Hartford, CT 06108. If you are able, please file any and all complaints within 48 hours of the incident.
Rider and Community Attendees: Ellen Gregory, Mary-Ann Langton, and Miriam Steinberg First Transit (FT) Attendees: Raymond Blethen, Andrew Burke, Karla Vera, and Rita Voskanova
Greater Hartford Transit District (the “District”) Attendees: Valerie Ellis, Margaret Pieniazek, and Pat Williams
The forum began at 5:00 p.m.
Operations:
July 2018 passengers trips were 36,875, no shows 1,328 (4%), and cancellations 9,413 (26%). August 2018 passengers trips were 40,799, no shows 1,475 (4%), and cancellations 8,846 (22%).
Customer Service:
In July 2018, 307 comments were received from passengers and 17% were compliments, 4% driver, dispatch, reservationist, and/or scheduling concerns, 7% late/early arrival, ride length or missed trip concerns, 14% invalid concerns, 1% mechanical and/or related to safety concerns, 0% door-to-door and/or related to wrong drop-off or pick-up concerns, 0% courtesy, 1% no-show concerns, 3% unknown, 1% other, and 52% n/a, record only.
In August 2018, 334 comments were received from passengers and 15% were compliments, 6% driver, dispatch, reservationist, and/or scheduling concerns, 7% late/early arrival, ride length or missed trip concerns, 14% invalid concerns, 1% mechanical and/or related to safety concerns, 0% door-to-door and/or related to wrong drop-off or pick-up concerns, 0% courtesy, 1% no show concerns, 7% unknown, 0% other, and 49% n/a, record only.
Staff Comments:
Mr. Burke provided an overview of how imminent arrival calls operate. He distributed the attached handout on this subject.
Participants’ Comments
Miriam Steinberg
She shared her concern regarding door-to-door service. In addition, she requested clarification on this subject and on scheduling trips.
Staff Response
FT staff explained how door-to-door service operates. FT will have a road supervisor investigate Ms. Steinberg’s residence to establish a safe pickup and drop-off location. As a reminder to all passengers, if door-to-door is not provided please inform the Customer Service Department. Drivers are responsible to review their runs in advance and work with dispatch to make any necessary scheduling updates to their runs.
Mary-Ann Langton
Her September 7, 2018 email reservation provided specific pickup instructions; however, they were not followed by the driver. She also experiences communication concerns when speaking with dispatch department on the telephone.
Staff Response th
FT staff will look into Ms. Langton’s September 7
Customer Service will investigate how staff can improve on their communications skills when addressing Ms. Langton over the telephone.
Ellen Gregory
She wanted to know the correct pickup/drop-off spot at Macy’s located at Westfarms Mall. She shared with the group a newspaper article provided to Ms. Williams in reference to the possibility of transportation expanding in Bristol due to Amazon opening a delivery station.
Staff Response
Ms. Voskanova informed her that the ADA pickup/drop-off is at the Macy’s entrance facing Wendy’s. ADA will make sure to notify passengers if there will be an expansion of service in Bristol.
The next ADA Participation Group forum is scheduled for November 14, 2018, Northend Sr. Center, 180 Coventry Street, Hartford, CT at 10:00 a.m. You may make a reservation for Paratransit service to and from the meeting by calling (860) 724-5340 and selecting option “1”. The ADA bus fare will be waived for this meeting. Please remember to give everyone a chance to participate; forum attendees need to keep initial questions and/or comments to five (5) minutes. Follow-up comments should also be kept to five (5) minutes. This information is available in an accessible format upon request.
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