Ken Russell, development director of John G Russell Transport, said it could take operators "weeks or months" to calculate the costs involved in a bid and get a quote to the customer.

He claimed this was damaging the sector, and that it needed to offer a much greater level of customer care, such as that seen in contract logistics.

"Rail needs to change. A truck operator can quote [for a job] in minutes; for rail it is months," he said.

"The rail industry is not very customer-focused, in terms of freight. If you look at the successes in rail, they tend to be [tie-ups], with the logistics industry fronting it. Rail needs to push harder."

Sarka Oldham, account manager for Direct Rail Services (DRS), said: "When I came into this industry, I was shocked how slow the rail freight industry was. We [DRS] have worked hard to improve that situation."

Tom Jones, senior rail strategist at Freightliner, said the calculations involved for rail were far more complicated than for road. "It is some decades now since rail was the common carrier that was obliged to take everything that was offered to it, whether it wanted to or not."

He said operators had been forced to be much more discerning over the freight it carried, but added: "We need to do a better job of helping people to ask the right questions of us. We receive a lot of proposals of things looking to move to rail, some of which are quite comical."

This was particularly the case with the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA), which as part of its green agenda had asked individual companies to approach rail operators, but had not organised consolidation centres to aggregate loads and make it cost-effective for rail operators.

"You need to use each mode to its strength, " said Jones. "If you ask ’can a rail operator deliver in the style of a road operator?’, that’s not what we do best. We deliver the products in the style of a rail operator.

"It’s a cheap comment to say that rail operators don’t innovate, and undermines a lot of achievements, " he added.

John Smith, MD of GBRf, said: "In terms of responding to bids, I would say that we respond quickly when we feel it is a worthwhile opportunity."

However, Frank Schuhholz, global rail product manager for Maersk group, confirmed it could take "weeks or months" to receive a quote from operators, which frustrated customers.

He said: "Customers do not understand why railways are not doing certain things.

"It might be obvious to them [the operators], but not to the customers."