Met Office loses BBC contract

[Weather Boy]

21 hours ago, Jo Farrow said:

many have worked for the Met Office for decades within the BBC weather centre. It prob won't be a lose job thing, more like new post uncertainty. Which has already being going on for over 2 years now. 

Shouldn't even be that, really.  Certainly the front-of-camera points will be covered by TUPE, which another poster mentioned.  All other operations connected to the TV and radio should also be TUPE.  Is there anything left? 

Problem with TUPE is that the employee is entitled to the same terms as the terms under the previous employer with the MASSIVE exception of pensions.  They do not have to be matched.  Therefore a cushy Meto final salary (I'm guessing - at least for a long server) pension will be forfeit (in terms of future pension arrangements, past are protected) and, here's the sting - no compensation for that!

The way TUPE works is that the employee doesn't have to accept it, but if they don't, it's deemed that you have handed in your notice.  So, that's alright then!

Perhaps all that is what you were alluding to regarding "new post uncertainty", Jo?

[Andy Bown]

22 hours ago, fergieweather said:

Not true. Rest assured I think all weather aficionados will be delighted when they see the final product and the massive improvements when visualising the weather 'story'. Bear in mind the scope of what we will be showing / mapping: ranging from global, right down to hyperlocal scale; with model products including ECMWF's full suite and UKMO-UKV to 'fuel' all you will see. Keep faith.

Hi Ian,

I read the news re Meteogroup around the same time as your Points West broadcast yesterday evening. Will you still be doing Points West regularly? I sincerely hope so. Thank you.

[Jo Farrow]

3 hours ago, skifreak said:

That doesn't make a KM shorter in Northern Scotland and longer in the South of England as the BBC map does. An approximate area calculation on the map I posted suggests it's fairly close to a 'same scale' map - each part of the land mass looking as it would appear if you were directly above it.

The BBC weather map on the other hand has England having a surface area slightly over 3x that of Scotland, where as England actually has 1.62x the land mass of Scotland. In terms of spatial resolution of the projected weather data, that means there's effectively space for only half as much information over Scotland as there should be.

This alongside the switch from round to square temperature symbols mean fewer temperature points are provided for Scotland and only exposed coastal locations. One of the standard locations for a temperature symbol on the UK wide map is Rosehearty which juts out into the sea in the NE corner near Fraserburgh. We no longer have a non coastal temperature that gives anything approaching a reasonable representation of temperature for the Northern Highlands, the Central Highlands or inner Moray Firth, or indeed for most of inland Scotland. That gives a completely distorted representation of the weather to go along with the distorted map, it fails to indicate cold weather adequately in winter and in decent summer weather the maximum temperature shown on a BBC weather map in the North of Scotland can be as much as 12ºc below the actual highest recorded in the Central Highlands. That factor is a genuine business grievance in the tourism sector in this part of the world.

 

 

The BBC would surely say that some extra detail is given in BBC Scotland broadcast and if you want north/west/east and tayside you could watch STV 

 

 

[Jo Farrow]

2 hours ago, Weather Boy said:

Shouldn't even be that, really.  Certainly the front-of-camera points will be covered by TUPE, which another poster mentioned.  All other operations connected to the TV and radio should also be TUPE.  Is there anything left? 

Problem with TUPE is that the employee is entitled to the same terms as the terms under the previous employer with the MASSIVE exception of pensions.  They do not have to be matched.  Therefore a cushy Meto final salary (I'm guessing - at least for a long server) pension will be forfeit (in terms of future pension arrangements, past are protected) and, here's the sting - no compensation for that!

The way TUPE works is that the employee doesn't have to accept it, but if they don't, it's deemed that you have handed in your notice.  So, that's alright then!

Perhaps all that is what you were alluding to regarding "new post uncertainty", Jo?

 

There are MO forecasters at BBC weather centre who don't appear on screen and the BBC blog said vast majority  of front of camera people, not all

[Weather Boy]

1 minute ago, Jo Farrow said:

The BBC would surely say that some extra detail is given in BBC Scotland broadcast and if you want north/west/east and tayside you could watch STV 

 

 

I don't buy that Jo!  Every region has their own forecasts. Why should the north or the UK have less detail on the national forecast than the south.  (speaking as a southerner:-)

[Weather Boy]

1 minute ago, Jo Farrow said:

There are MO forecasters at BBC weather centre who don't appear on screen and the BBC blog said vast majority  of front of camera people, not all

I strongly suspect that they say 'vast majority' because the employees aren't obliged to transfer, and some may choose not to - but they won't know for ages because the transfer isn't happening until the Spring.

[skifreak]

5 minutes ago, Jo Farrow said:

There are MO forecasters at BBC weather centre who don't appear on screen and the BBC blog said vast majority  of front of camera people, not all

That doesn't address the inadequacies of the BBC network forecasts though. Viewers in the rest of the UK don't get the Scotland forecasts, so regional forecasts  don't address the valid concerns of tourism businesses in Highland Scotland.

We're not asking for special treatment for Scotland in the forecasts, just the same as the South of the UK. If the TV licence was as geographically tapered as the BBC forecast map perhaps what we pay in Scotland would better reflect what the BBC spends on services in Scotland!

[Jo Farrow]

6 minutes ago, Weather Boy said:

I strongly suspect that they say 'vast majority' because the employees aren't obliged to transfer, and some may choose not to - but they won't know for ages because the transfer isn't happening until the Spring.

 

Blimey , not much weight in that statement for the cut throat business of television. Can't imagine this will all be neatly tied up in a HR bow . BBC are facing massive pressure about money, they state that in the blog. This has been in the off-ing for years and will be like a game of chess, sadly around people's life long careers. This is for the London based BBC weather centre, I think most if not all the nations and regions presenters are already employed by BBC and Carol Kirkwood

[Jo Farrow]

10 minutes ago, skifreak said:

That doesn't address the inadequacies of the BBC network forecasts though. Viewers in the rest of the UK don't get the Scotland forecasts, so regional forecasts  don't address the valid concerns of tourism businesses in Highland Scotland.

We're not asking for special treatment for Scotland in the forecasts, just the same as the South of the UK. If the TV licence was as geographically tapered as the BBC forecast map perhaps what we pay in Scotland would better reflect what the BBC spends on services in Scotland!

 

( I work for scottish ITV),  Maybe Meteogroup will have what you want from a UK map, so all is well. BBC isn't an advert for any tourism business. Skegness mayor complains if BBC weather says it will rain on a Bank holiday.   SW Britain is about to have a rubbish weekend with gales, the UK weather is unreliable. 

[skifreak]

2 hours ago, Jo Farrow said:

 BBC isn't an advert for any tourism business. Skegness mayor complains if BBC weather says it will rain on a Bank holiday.   SW Britain is about to have a rubbish weekend with gales, the UK weather is unreliable. 

There's a significant difference between a forecast for naff weather and a forecast that maybe goes wrong, and a TV forecast set-up that misrepresents the forecast weather for a large portion of Scotland because of a false and misleading map projection (which compromises the level of detail and info that can be provided). 

[Methuselah]

16 minutes ago, skifreak said:

There's a significant difference between a forecast for naff weather and a forecast that maybe goes wrong, and a TV forecast set-up that misrepresents the forecast weather for a large portion of Scotland because of a false and misleading map projection (which compromises the level of detail and info that can be provided). 

Please skifreak, can you not give it a rest? 

[Stargazer]

As for the flat vs curved map debate...on the whole I don't mind the curved map, but the way it's used does give rise to a minor gripe for me: those of us that live in central southern England sometimes don't get to see our area on the map at all, or at any rate we only see it for a matter of milliseconds.  We're off the western edge of the map while the SE is featured and half a second later the presenter is standing in front of our area on the map explaining what's going on in the SW, and the graphic whizzes northwards bypassing our area yet again.

[Summer Sun]

Matt Hugo's view on it

 

[Jo Farrow]

 http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/news/releases/2016/new-STV-weather 

[TheRepublic2015]

Final 3...

1. MeteoGroup

2. The Weather Company An IBM company ( WSI, Weather Central, Weather Underground - The Weather Channel )

3. Metra - current systems provider

 

UKMO were eliminated in first round.

All 3 of these service providers are highly respected global weather service companies, there's no reason why they can't provide a better service than the UKMO.

MeteoGroup (London 10+ years) and The Weather Company (Birmingham 25+ years) both have UK forecast centers with experienced UK forecasters.

Forecast Watch consistently rank monthly global and UK forecast accuracy % of both companies higher than UKMO.

 

Edited August 24, 2016 by TheRepublic2015
typo

[Methuselah]

I'm glad it didn't go to either Accuweather or Weatheraction; that would have made for some fantastical forecasts!

[JeffC]

1 hour ago, Ed Stone said:

I'm glad it didn't go to either Accuweather or Weatheraction; that would have made for some fantastical forecasts!

imagine if Exacta weather had been in for it...

[Nick L]

2 minutes ago, JeffC said:

imagine if Exacta weather had been in for it...

I don't think that one man and his fraudulent imagination have the clout to get such a contract, thankfully

[JeffC]

Just now, Nick L said:

I don't think that one man and his fraudulent imagination have the clout to get such a contract, thankfully

indeed not but it could've made for some good fairytale reading!

[The PIT]

1 hour ago, TheRepublic2015 said:

Forecast Watch consistently rank monthly global and UK forecast accuracy % of both companies higher than UKMO.

 

Got a link to that???

[TheRepublic2015]

http://www.forecasangel delightch.com/

Can't supply results as it's a paid-for service, we receive monthly results - these results compare the accuracy of all the major global service providers, including the UKMO / BBC.

Edited August 24, 2016 by TheRepublic2015

[TheRepublic2015]

On 21/08/2016 at 22:53, Jo Farrow said:

 http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/news/releases/2016/new-STV-weather 

I believe Presentation Cartography who supply the UKMO's new graphic system is a relatively new company created by 3 ex - Metra (current BBC graphic system supplier) employees. The UKMO partnered / bought the company after dropping the ageing Metra WeatherScape system just prior to the BBC tender, it's the system the UKMO used for their BBC bid, though it was in early stages of development then.

[Jo Farrow]

1 hour ago, TheRepublic2015 said:

I believe Presentation Cartography who supply the UKMO's new graphic system is a relatively new company created by 3 ex - Metra (current BBC graphic system supplier) employees. The UKMO partnered / bought the company after dropping the ageing Metra WeatherScape system just prior to the BBC tender, it's the system the UKMO used for their BBC bid, though it was in early stages of development then.

 

and it is now what STV (in conjunction with the MO) have just launched this week, so I get to use it too. VisualCortex

[Jo Farrow]

it says that in the STV press release i posted before "The new visualisation software, 'Visual Cortex' has been developed with our partner Presentation Cartography and offers a new way of experiencing the weather forecast using graphics which are striking and engaging."

[Jo Farrow]

That's Alex Deakin doing Met Office video today http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/mobile/video/  in his new chosen post

So no more BBC appearances for now.

Me and Alex started our Met Office forecaster training together back in 1997 at Shinfield Park, the MO weather bubble of a training college. He's a lovely chap
Could be a few more presenter moves and changes before the new BBC contract starts.

All of ITV are now using the new MET OFFICE graphics system http://www.itv.com/presscentre/press-releases/itv-broadcast-home-met-office-weather