At the end of December 2022, some 200,000 travelers had to change their plans to get to their New Year’s Eve venue. Christmas, after the removal of their trains because of a new strike by the controllers, sharply criticized by the SNCF and the government for not being satisfied with the 12% salary increase granted in two years.
On the evening of Wednesday December 21, the railway company announced a slightly downgraded transport plan for Saturday and Sunday compared to the initial forecasts, with two out of five TGVs removed (instead of one in three initially).
A 2007 law
In such cases, a question regularly comes up in the minds of users: but in fact, should an SNCF employee declare himself before participating in a possible strike? We answer you.
“The 2007 law requires employees of a transport company to declare their intention to go on strike 48 hours before, thus allowing management to take steps to establish an adapted transport plan and thus ensure a service”, says the government.
How does the SNCF organize itself during a strike?
Concretely, since 2007, employees who participate in the movement of trains must file an individual declaration of intent (DII) to participate in a strike. And this, 48 hours before a possible movement, so that the SNCF can adapt its transport plans.
Then, “it is the Transport Organizing Authorities (AOT), i.e. the elected representatives of local authorities, who set the priorities and set the levels of service to be maintained”continues the government on its website.
Once the transport plans have been established (in particular according to the declarations of the striking personnel), “a consolidation of services is organized on each axis, each line and each activity in order to determine the general state of the traffic (normal, little disturbed, disturbed or very disturbed)”. It is only after that that the SNCF announces to its passengers in order to communicate to them the traffic forecasts.
Read also: SNCF strike. What are the transportation alternatives for parties?
What about canceled train tickets?
Each passenger, whose train has been canceled as part of this strike, will benefit from a voucher equivalent to twice the amount of the ticketannounced the SNCF, even if the ticket was exchanged for another.
Travelers whose train has been canceled will also be able to change their ticket without paying the price difference, specifies the SNCF. But most of the maintained trains are already full.