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AMTRAK, LONG-DISTANCE TRAINS, AND CONGRESSIONAL FUNDING

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[quote user="oltmannd"] Off the top of my head, equipment costs.  For trains of the same capacity, the LD trains have more cars and locomotives per "seat".  [/quote] Amtrak's largest single expense is labor. In FY12 salaries, wages, and benefits gobbled up 50.4 per cent of its operating expenses and 70.7 per cent of its revenues. Depreciation was 16.4 per cent of operating expenses..   The labor expense associated with the long distance trains probably is higher than the average system labor expense, whereas the long distance depreciation expense probably is much lower than the system depreciation expense.  Most of it is in the NEC and the other on the ground properties owned by Amtrak.  A key point, however, is to realize that without access to Amtrak's books outsiders don't know how labor and depreciation impacts Amtrak's expense structure per business line. The standard crew for the Texas Eagle, as an example, consists of an engineer, conductor, assistant conductor, sleeping car attendant, coach car attendant, lounge car attendant, and three dining car employees. The on-board staff run end point to end point, but the "operating personnel" change at least four times between San Antonio and Chicago. The engineers add another change in Austin.   Most of the Eagle's operating crew members are on the train for less than eight hours, but their benefit costs probably are annualized. These benefits get charged to train operations. In addition, most of long distance train crews (operating as well as on-board service crew members) are away from home at least one or more nights, which means substantial overnight accommodation charges to train expenses.   By contrast the Pennsylvania has an engineer, conductor, assistant conductor and a cafe car attendant. The operating crew makes one change in Harrisburg. There is some overnight expense associated with the train, but it is less than a comparable long distance train. What is the labor cost per passenger mile for the Texas Eagle and the Pennsylvanian?  Don't know for sure, but Amtrak's Monthly Operating Report for September 2012 contains a hint.  The cost of the OPEBS per passenger mile for the Eagle was .0082 cents whereas the cost for the Pennsylvanian was .0062 cents. OPEB is the accrued expense for future liability of health care for pensioned employees. It probably is comparable when spread over common units, i.e. train miles, seat miles, passenger miles, etc. How difficult would it be to determine the assignable crew costs for the Texas Eagle, Pennsylvanian or any of Amtrak's trains. Send a junior accountant to the payroll department and pull the payroll records for the regular and temporary crew members. Get their time cards.  Plug the information into a spreadsheet. Then go to the benefits administrator and get the data for each employee. Plug it into the spreadsheet. That would be most of the avoidable labor cost for the Texas Eagle.  The same thing could be done for the entire business line. And for many of the other costs (expenses). The time required to realize the labor savings from discontinuance would depend on the severance terms of the labor contracts and the re-assignable residuals from any management and supervisory personnel that wold be retained because they supervise more than one train or business line.   It might take a reasonably smart junior accountant a day to get the information, put it into the spreadsheet, and have the results ready for the boss in the morning. At least in a competitive business where one is expected to hustle and get it correct. The fact that Amtrak has not optimized its SAP installation or its Route Performance Tracking System does not mean that it does not have the information to determine its costs.  Because it blew the installation of SAP, which is another story, means that it just takes a lot longer to get the information.  But its there. Has to be to comply with IRS as well as other interested party requirements.
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