I got to work a little early yesterday, I had some books to take back to the library and I had allowed more time than I really needed, just to be on the safe side. As it happened I was needed so I got a few minutes overtime, always useful with holidays coming up. An other driver had been late for his break and he had by law to take a 30 minute break so I was able to take his X46 to Paignton and back. When he had had his 30 minutes it was time for my 12A to go to Newton so he was able to do that part of my duty. So both buses ran thanks to some expert juggling of resources by the controllers. When I took over my bus on it's way back from Newton all I had to do was go to Brixham and back to Paignton for my meal break. However when I got to Churston Bridge on the way into Brixham there was a hold up, traffic down to a crawl on what is normally a fast road. Five minutes later I reach the scene of the accident, sorry collision as accidents are now known. I knew at once that we were going to be delayed seriously for the next couple of hours and told both controls and all the other mobiles this. I left Brixham a couple of minutes late and then spend 30 minutes getting back to the crash site. The 12A in front of me had managed to get past before the traffic had built up too much and was only 5 minutes down, this mean that there would be a gap in the service of 35 minutes and I was likely to be greeted by not happy passengers along the way.
When I got to the Zoo two people got on and angrily stated that they had been waiting over an hour. Now normally when people have been waiting like this I am sympathetic and explain the problem but I knew they could not have been there an hour. If you are going to complain get your facts right. 40 minutes would have been more to the point and I said so. An other passenger standing behind these two belligerent muppets butted in and asked had the accident been a bad one. The belligerent muppets then changed track and told me that the school children at the bus stop were very badly behaved and why should they be subjected to this kind of behavior while waiting for a bus. Again this was a gross exaggeration and was not to be allowed and I said that in my opinion, and I had picked this group of children up many times so I should know, these boys and girls from Paignton Community College were very well behaved and I always liked having them on the bus. Indeed the children had allowed the muppets to board the bus first, something the children from several other schools in the area would not have done. Muppets paid their fare and went and sat down. It is said that ; "Customers are alway right", I would add; "except when they are wrong."
Then into Paignton for my meal break 35 minutes down, no problem as the bus I was due to take over was also 35 minutes down so I got my 30 minutes break. As I waited for my bus to arrive a female passenger was escorted off a Torquay bound bus. An other passenger who had just got off the bus told me that the female passenger, who had boarded the bus at South Devon College, had been using the most appalling language at the top of her voice on the bus and the driver had requested the Paignton controller remove her from the bus, which he did. Bad language is an increasing problem but to have it screamed at you on a bus is not a pleasant way to spend an afternoon and should not be tolerated. As I stated earlier I pick school children up from Paignton Community College, I also pick students up from South Devon College. I would quite happily give a few of the students, only a few I should stress, from South Devon College a miss any day of the week.
5 comments:
Its nice to hear someone praising kids for once !! Some are a nightmare I know but its always lovely to hear someone notice the well behaved kids !!
Ironically the worst behaved kids I have ever seen in my life were from the very exclusive Marlbrough College. They ran riot in a bowling alley, tipping up chairs, throwing bowling balls at the mechanics , kicking the fruit machines, swearing at the staff. this all from kids who are alleged to be in the top 5% in the country intelligence ways.
Yet the kids who were in a few weeks later from the behaviour unit, all admitted to the unit due to extreme behaviour probs were as good as gold, polite and a real pleasure to have in !!
Go figure !
Muppets?
Have you been reading The Driver's Bloodbus blog by any chance?
or is now a standard term amongst bus drivers?
Hey there David, I was wondering wether you lot down in devon have GPS's in your cabs or do you just have to count it out in your head? We have some terrible school children down in Brighton :) Great Blog as always!
Why do they lie about how long they've been waiting? Two days ago someone claimed to have been waiting from 8:30 PM until 10:00 PM for a bus that runs once an hour. "It never came!" So I check the schedule. "Well the last one left at 8:08 PM. No more after that." "The 8:08 bus never came because really, uh, I was there at 7:30, or uh, 7:15. So there were two buses that didn't come." So I check the schedule again, "The bus before the 8:08 came at 7:08, so I guess you missed him too." At this point, I expected him to have claimed to have been at the stop at 6:30, so I thrust a schedule book in his hands and said, "I've gotta go. Need to stay on time. Very important", and left.
Yeah, but passengers love to complain and like to make the story a whole load more dramatic.
"Ive been stood here for 15 minutes" is nowhere near as good as "Ive been stood here for an hour" - even when the service is every 15 minutes and you just passed the bus infront of you going the other way.
I just smile and say, I dont think you have, I have just passed the 10 past bus going the other way. Then they realise I aint got an inch of sympathy.
Granted however, I do explain if I know people have waited a long time, most of which understand that buses get stuck in traffic too, we dont float over it.
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