Aircoach launching Belfast - Dublin Airport - Dublin City Express

Probably not because people have to actually know about the service to use it, and I would expect the Ulsterbus/Bus Eireann and NIR/IE partnerships will do whatever they can to stop it.

There's still no timetable on the Aircoach site, that speaks volumes.

bk wrote: »

And what in gods name does "Catch Yourself On." mean?

Can't they just replace these stupid, non English sub titles with something meaningful like "Just 2 hours 10 minutes".

Yes the flyer should also have the Euro prices and the Irish numbers and website, etc.

They're a lost cause really, they seem to be targeting just passengers in Belfast when they need to be targeting both ends. Just like on the Cork route they seem to be targeting only Cork people and little to no promotion in Dublin.

Has anyone actually pointed out to them where they are going wrong and did they get anything back? I wouldn't be surprised if even if you did, they didn't really take any of it on board. They certainly ignore any tweets to them on twitter.

I just checked their twitter and Facebook (which is advertised nowhere on their site), and it seems they haven't even tweeted about the Belfast service, nor have they posted about it on Facebook.

A quick search shows they're also getting a lot of people tweeting them who are not being answered, and also looking at their Facebook it seems that they don't seem to take criticism very well with any moan issued with a canned response of "We'll pass it to management"

That is my problem with Aircoach - a lot of these things do not take a lot of time yet they are still not done. To be fair to them they do seem to respond to queries on Facebook pretty quickly, but they do not advertise they have a Facebook presence anywhere, having a Facebook icon on the timetable is no good if they have no mention of it on their website or a link.

What ideally needs to happen is the following:
1) Someone spend an hour or two going through the website, reviewing and updating every page and bringing it all up to date.
2) Every time news is posted, cross post it on Facebook and on Twitter. There are applications you can even get to do it for you.
3) Make sure Facebook and Twitter is promoted more heavily on the website. All you need is a little icon, like the one on the Dublin Bus site. Social networking DOES drum up extra business.
4) Respond to all tweets. Customer service staff should be doing this themselves. It's not hard to log in and check a few times a day.
5) Be more open to criticism, as I used to say in an old job, every interaction we have with a customer is a chance to exceed their expectations.
6) The Belfast service has launched. Why not set the website up to randomly alternate between a banner for Belfast and one for Cork? That is what I did in a previous company in another industry.

You know if routes don't work at the end of the day Aircoach need to take a long hard look at themselves, it doesn't matter how operationally excellent you are if you get the basics in other areas wrong. With competition being so fierce, you would expect that Bus Eireann, GoBus and Irish Rail and any other competitors will look to exploit what they see as being Aircoach's worst failings. A modern, dynamic, well run company will make sure that they close such opportunistic chances of rivals by ensuring it is all up to scratch and there is no gap left to exploit in the first place.

Unfortunately for all concerned a buy out and a new management team may be better for everyone in the long run. Aircoach used to be a visionary company but now it seems to be treading water and lacking effort in areas. More attention to detail, engagement with it''s customers and target market is required if they want to be successful in such a tough marketplace.

They just lack attention to detail most IMHO and you're probably right with regards to the web skills. I'd assume the news system is via a CMS and the online ticketing system has some sort of admin tool when the rest does not, hence why stuff is not updating. But if that was the case they should have got a new website built long before now, the existing one has been around for around 7-8 years (check archive.org for aircoach.ie).

To the outsider though they generally don't seem bothered which is a bad thing and can create a negative perception. They are spending money on marketing, but just contracting someone to do web work for them just to fix up the problems and improve things even for a couple of days would be a big help. They need people who are creative, passionate and have flair and desire to improve such things and they seem to lack that.

I doubt anyone from Aircoach is reading this, but would be nice if they are!

The Coach stop at O'Connell Street opposite the Gresham has NO INFORMATION in it. It seems that someone has took out the Airport service information, and replaced it with nothing so now we have empty timetable displays. Is it so hard to print out a sheet of paper, put it in the display for both services? Why remove the old one if you didn't have a new one to put in?

Once again another failing, hence a confused gentleman asking passers by, does the coach to Belfast go from here or the other side of the road, I told him I had no idea but I assume he was at the right stop but I couldn't be sure. Then some taxi drivers came along and poached another two passengers waiting for the airport as I had the conversation, the taxi driver argued that the service has ceased, hence why there was no timetable.

Obviously incorrect, but once again, self inflicted by Aircoach. How do you expect people to trust the service when there is no timetable information at the stop. I think they're getting worse for updating on street information than Dublin Bus, and really that is quite something.

The journey is much shorter though, so you would probably need less coaches to run 22 services on the Belfast route vs 17 on the Cork.

Although the service HAS to be marketed more for it to be a success.