Thursday 25 October 2007

Tickets and Tides

We have a variety of tickets here in Torbay, some are day tickets and some for a week, month or year. All have a date printed on the ticket which shows when it expires. All period tickets get looked at carefully by me to make sure the passenger hasn't overlooked the fact that his/her ticket is no longer valid due to the fact that the ticket is now no longer of any use for travel on the bus and is now just a worthless piece of paper that should be disposed of in a litter bin somewhere. Throw it on the floor of the bus if you like, we employ a dedicated band of bus cleaners who's only aim in life is to turn a messy bus into a shinning, clean bus for people to travel on the next day. But please don't show it me. Like I say, I do check all dates and I even get nasty looks of some people when I do, as is I were questioning their honesty. I wish I didn't have to check the damn things so carefully, it would make my life much easier if I could look and see the passenger had a ticket in his/her hand and just wave then on to the bus. But of I did then the person who boarded the bus last night with the ticket below would have continued to deprive the company of revenue and the fares would have had to go up for everyone to compensate.

The passenger wasn't happy when I took the ticket of him which suggests he was planing to use the ticket again even though I had pointed out it was grossly out of date.

An other photo taken while waiting in the queue of traffic at the roadworks, it was only a few minutes to high tide which was fortunate. Had it been two hours to high tide and the sea coming over like this then the road would have been closed to add to our problems.


4 comments:

Buncha said...

2 months travel for nothing, I bet he just picks up another ticket off the bus floor.

Do your company employ ticket inspectors David? Do all the drivers check tickets ? and do you get in trouble if you get caught with these freeriders on board?

In my neck of the woods it just too dangerous to check tickets and ticket inspectors work in pairs or in big groups with a police escort.

Pizza Hut Team Member said...

What does Leader - Staff Pass mean? Surely it doesn't mean the person trying to use it is a member of staff?

David said...

The ticket would have been issued to one of the foreign language schools that run in the Bay in the summer and that ticket would have been used by some one making a few extra bob sheparding gangs of none English speaking children round the flesh pots of Torquay, (both of them). I doubt very much if the person who tried to use it would have been a Team Leader.

We do employ a ticket inspector. He works on his own which is still posible here and no, we don't have to run naked through the bus wash (which uses cold water) if some is on the bus without a ticket. Not unless it is a 16 year old nymphet who is drapped over the ticket machine as you drive up Fleet St.
PS That doesn't happen. At least I don't think so.

Buncha said...

Running naked through the bus wash..Please David don't give the management ideas like that.lol