Is it unreasonable? (bus driver content)

Up here in civilisation (merseyside) we can travel all day after 9.30 for £4.50 on buses, trains and feries, and at anytime weekends and bank holidays.
there are also seperate tickets just for busses and one for just trains, so easy.

Strangely our dutch train company make little effort to collect fares, or sell tickets as their are few barriers, and train guards just seem to guard their little compartment at the back of the train.

What is it about this country with crap service apparently being acceptable. There seems to be no effort made by public services to make the customers happy and put them first.

Simple solution – carry more float so you can give people change? Don’t have crap bus fares – try £4 instead of £4.10.

😕

I would also refuse to carry any more than £10 float on the grounds that it would increase the likelyhood of being robbed as I travel to and from work.

Not the customers problem, not your fault either really, better system needed.

Taxi drivers always seem to be able to cope with giving change.

Had a spate of problems with the missus and bus drivers. From one telling her that foreigners should f*ck off back to their own country. To another that stopped the bus a few yards from the stop, let others on, then closed the door refusing to let her on, then driving to the bus stop opening and closing the doors and driving off.
The same driver refusing her pass repeatedly. The same driver refusing to issue a return ticket.
Went on for a while, I reported it everytime to stagecoach, she hasn’t seen him for a long time now.

Then there was the driver who took her on the wrong bus route, when there was a detour, and thought it was funny to drop her back at the same spot she had got on at 20 minutes later. She had asked if it was the Gateshead or Newcastle bus, due to a turn around detour on the bus route. He had chatted quite politely with her though during the journey, so she was just a bit bemused by it all.

At the same time she has had some really nice ones who have gone out of their way to make sure she gets off at the right stop when she is off somewhere new. Although they might not have an option as she is quite persistant when it comes to checking where she is going.

Don’t have crap bus fares – try £4 instead of £4.10.

I would definitely be booking a holiday when fares go up.

How much to Somewheretown?
That will be £3 please.
But it was only £2 yesterday!
It’s these new non crap rounded to the nearest pound fares some customers have asked us to use. 🙄

Taxi drivers always seem to be able to cope with giving change.

Taxi drivers don’t have several hundred fares daily and can pop into shops/garages to get change between trips.

So, the system is broken.

Drivers can’t carry large floats for safety reasons.

Customers can’t get the change because we are moving away from a cashless society.

Saver tickets (on my wife’s route anyway) don’t work for people who use bus for 3 or less days a week. Which is still almost 300 journeys a year!

What should change? The entire way that small financial transactions are made or the bus companies policy towards giving change?

It’s been said already, but this sort of rubbish is why we need to educate people that there is a better way: the bicycle. As long as you don’t get run over by a bus, it’s faster cheaper and easier. I dream of the day Britain gets decent bike infastructure, not just a bike/bus/taxi lane (surely a taxi is just a car, it’s called a private cab, it’s private transport!)

I can’t see why you can’t use a card to pay
Pretty much every business these days accepts payment by card

Pretty much every business these days accepts payment by card

Would passengers be willing to cover the credit card charge, the extra cost of a data call from the cab to check card validity and available credit plus the cost of installing all the equipment in the first place to solve a problem that just doesn’t affect the vast majority of customers who have weekly passes or concessionary travel cards.

I doesnt help the Mrs Spider but weekly tickets can be bought with a card at PrePay/Paypoint shops. They won’t do daily ticket due to the credit card charges being such a high percentage.

Prepay travel cards are slow making their way into the industry which solves the issue of change however they are currently only in limited areas. Some areas also do tickets for 10 or 20 journeys with a long validity.

My wife has written to FIRST asking for clarification of their policy. I’ll post the reply on here if we get one.

A bus company boss earlier

I expect the response will be along the lines of,

“We are not a bank. Good Day.”

?

That’s a nice bike stand.

I just came across this thread whilst seeing if poor treatment by bus drivers was usual as i saw an incident today where some jumped up bus driver who thinks he rules the world told two women he didnt have change when they asked to pay with a fiver for a 4.60 fare. Number one what a joke and number 2 i just wish to reply to a comment made on here by a bus driver about him afraid of being robbed on his way to and from work if he carried more than £10 in change. Im sorry but where in the world do you work where its so dangerous and deadly to carry more than £10 on you. There are tramps all ovcer the uk who have more in their pockets. If it was the case anyone with more than a tenner was likely of being robbed i think there would be not enough robbers to keep up with the demand of trying to rob anyone who looked wealthy enough to have even a twenty. Stop making up feeble pathetic excuses you lowlife power grabbing bus drivers and start behaving and acting like a nice human being and help your own race by doing a little bit to make everyones life more pleasant. In otherwords learn how not to be a ****.

Ps i only joined up on this forum to have a go at him. Maybe i have too much time on my hands 😛

Oh. Well, erm…

Nice weather for this time of year….

😐

Ps i only joined up on this forum to have a go at him. Maybe i have too much time on my hands

Most certainly.

I think bus drivers’ attitudes have improved in the last 3 months, no doubt as a result of this thread.

I’d forgotten about this. Now I’m all angry again.

I hadn’t realised that buses didn’t allow payment by card…

WTF are they on, easy fix – change law so that buses must be equipped with card readers. Sorted out the security problem of carrying cash.

I hadn’t realised that buses didn’t allow payment by card…

They do…

Sod chip-n-pin though. Can you imagine how long that would take?

My dad Is a bus driver and the company are phasing out “Pay as you ride” you will have to buy a ticket at the stop (like pay and display ticket)

my dad has been mugged 3 or 4 times for his cash till.

That payment system only exists in the nightmares I’ve had about twisted version of hell where everyone hates everyone else and there’s no green open spaces. Non?

He hasnt been mugged as often as the passengers then

Sod chip-n-pin though. Can you imagine how long that would take?

Never used the M6 Toll-Road? Just stick the card in and pull it out, no pin.

And remind me, Oyster, where exactly other than the Smoke does that work?

Elf can’t compute anything outside of Zone 6.

You guys do make me laugh – loads of folk who wouldn’t be seen dead on a bus complaining about lack of change.

I am used to buses that don’t give change – its no big issue really – just have the right money with you or accept getting no change – or do a deal with another passenger.

Its a total non issue to regular bus users.

I do travel everywhere by public transport as im unable to drive due to a having a right arm that goes numb randomly due to damaged nerves and due to the fact i pay for my fare i expect to be treated well not like scum just because i have got on a bus with a five pound note or even a tenner. Almost anyone who gets on a bus usually goes out of there way in kindness for the driver and the bus company and easyiness and cost saving for themselves to either pre purchase a ticket or have correct or close to the correct change yet in the off chance i dont happen to, i dont expect to be had a go at or made to feel like i am creating an amazingly big problem just because i present a larger denomination. Its a small occurence where a note is used on a bus yet due to it being a service where money is handled and goods are sold i do expect them to have change and prepare accordingly for the situation of us having a note just like any other transport service or any service involving money in general. I dont use anything else in the entire world where i am ever told im sorry we dont have change. In absolutley no other situation occurs thats why people get so annoyed by it as we simply see it as a requirement that should be provided. I have used buses in italy, cyprus, the usa where they either have prepay options at the bus stop, have a free bus service or have the option of giving change. In particular in cyprus they let you go 3 stops without having to pay which makes sense as i dont see how it costs them £2.20 if you only go one stop compared with the whole bus route.

I do travel everywhere by public transport as im unable to drive due to a having a right arm that goes numb randomly due to damaged nerves and due to the fact i pay for my fare i expect to be treated well not like scum just because i have got on a bus with a five pound note or even a tenner. Almost anyone who gets on a bus usually goes out of there way in kindness for the driver and the bus company and easyiness and cost saving for themselves to either pre purchase a ticket or have correct or close to the correct change yet in the off chance i dont happen to, i dont expect to be had a go at or made to feel like i am creating an amazingly big problem just because i present a larger denomination. Its a small occurence where a note is used on a bus yet due to it being a service where money is handled and goods are sold i do expect them to have change and prepare accordingly for the situation of us having a note just like any other transport service or any service involving money in general. I dont use anything else in the entire world where i am ever told im sorry we dont have change. In absolutley no other situation occurs thats why people get so annoyed by it as we simply see it as a requirement that should be provided. I have used buses in italy, cyprus, the usa where they either have prepay options at the bus stop, have a free bus service or have the option of giving change. In particular in cyprus they let you go 3 stops without having to pay which makes sense as i dont see how it costs them £2.20 if you only go one stop compared with the whole bus route.

TL;DR

Just seen this thread and the wine is helping to make it very funny.

It has been a long time since I was on a bus. In fact, I think you could still smoke upstairs at the time.

I do have a fair bit of experience being on the receiving end of their inconsiderate and at times dangerous driving.

##note for any bus drivers. The highway code may say to give way for buses but at least indicate before to try to kill me##

Never used the M6 Toll-Road? Just stick the card in and pull it out, no pin.

Sweet; all I need is to nick a credit/debit card off someone else! Free travel! 😀

I don’t drive, so it’s not something that would affect me. Besides, those tolls also use an electronic tag system, which gives a discount on the journey. Bit like Oyster then…

And remind me, Oyster, where exactly other than the Smoke does that work?

Not my fault if Non-Londoners are too stupid to adopt such a brilliantly effective system… 🙂

Elf can’t compute anything outside of Zone 6.

I rarely have the need to, thank God. 😐

It’s a total non issue to regular bus users.

It might be an issue to the Hard Of Thinking though, Jeremy. Such as some folk on here…

I am used to buses that don’t give change – its no big issue really – just have the right money with you or accept getting no change – or do a deal with another passenger.

Seriously? I mean I don’t mind the odd couple of centimos here and there as it works both ways, and it does here. But if I thought the bus companies were systematically ripping paying customers off, ffs! That’s theft.

Elf, and you wonder why you are on the receiving end on a daily basis?

Well I do like to please my fayns. 😀

Out of curiosity I just looked at the bus timetable on the internet.
Seems there are actually nine buses that pass through here each weekday. Five South and four North. I would have guessed at four!

Sadly there was no fare information on the website. I cant see that it could even come close to being as cheap as the car from what you lot are saying. However, I might take the kids for a jaunt. I really don’t think they have ever been on a bus other than from Schiphol to the plane.
I think we may have found a half term afternoon filler if the weather is as poor as forecast.

most companies who use the no change system, put the ‘overs’ into a kitty which pays for the staff xmas nite out.
i understand that a passenger may think ‘whats the big deal, its only 60p change the driver needs to give me’
however, when i pull up at a bus stop and 30 people get on and most of them need 60p change it adds up.
i regularly do an early run to glasgow where the bus starts at the bus station, stops once on the way out of town, then heads off onto the motorway, the fare to get to the first stop is £1.50.
i regularly get 2 guys (both travelling together) who will individually hand me a £20 note to pay me for a £1.50 fare, which means instead of having £40 of change, i have £3.
i dont complain, i believe its my job to be decent to people as well as drive, but if the 3rd person gets on with, say, a fiver for the same fare, i dont have the change to give them.
no excuse to be rude though, thats well out of order.
in my opinion, the vast majority of people do try to have change, as evidence, i rarely have a shortage at end of shift, its the tiny majority who cause a (minor) problem 1st thing in the morning.
as for oyster/debit card payments, that would entail new ticket machines which cost £1k a pop, which, ultimately, the customers are going to pay for.

Its a total non issue to regular bus users.

Does that make it okay then? 😐

Take a couple of 10 notes and 2 fivers as well as start with another 40 in change and all is well. any corner shop know they may have anyone walk in to buy a copy of the sun with a £20 note and i have never seen them refused and the service is no different.