Igonrant Bus Drivers

swingking

I was getting on at Trinity College yesterday at about 6 and as
you would imagine the bus stop was jammers. Anyway to cut a long story short as a was getting in and putting my ticket in the machine he then tells me that it is too full up. I asked him for a receipt as the ticket was a 2 easy ticket, he tells me no. The funny thing is as I get off the bus another person gets on puts money into machine, takes ticket and stays there.

I want to know if this is a money making scam from Dublin Bus and is it worth comlaining about

Opinions

SpittingImage

it's worth complaining about but unfortunatetely, this rudeness and downright wanker behaviour stems from the top down. The inspectors are rude and hostile aswell.

muletide

swingking wrote:

I was getting on at Trinity College yesterday at about 6 and as
you would imagine the bus stop was jammers. Anyway to cut a long story short as a was getting in and putting my ticket in the machine he then tells me that it is too full up. I asked him for a receipt as the ticket was a 2 easy ticket, he tells me no. The funny thing is as I get off the bus another person gets on puts money into machine, takes ticket and stays there.

I want to know if this is a money making scam from Dublin Bus and is it worth comlaining about

Opinions

It is definitely a money making scam definitely. Just think about €1.65 per journey that amounts to over €100 a day. Quick ring Charlie Bird I reckon this is the last nail in Ivor Callellys coffin.

or maybe

It was just an ignorant bus driver

Ray777

I'm sure it's not a money making scam, but it's certainly worth complaining about (provided you have enough info, regarding route number, bus number, etc).

johnnyrotten

The mistake you made was getting off the bus

Stark

I hate when you're waiting at a terminus for the bus driver to open the doors of the bus to let you on, and instead the bus speeds off even though you're hailing him down :mad:

johnnyrotten

I hate it when you try to overtake a bus ,Stopped at bus stop, and the F€cker pulls out

Mimikyu

This post has been deleted.

shltter

Solitaryman666 wrote:

This post has been deleted.

Well you would be waiting as the Driver has no way of issuing a receipt

The Ticket if you put it in the machine will have all the details if you want to complain.
However the Driver does not have to carry anyone once the Bus is full even if you have placed your ticket in the machine.
You would not have to put the ticket back in the machine once the next bus came just tell the driver what happened if an inpector boarded the Bus to check tickets they have a ticket reader that would verify your story.

As to the other part of your complaint you should not have left the Bus if the driver allowed someone else to board after you. However I suspect that as that person was paying a cash fare that person may have been on the Bus before you waiting to pay when you boarded however if you make a complaint all buses are fitted with video and that would show exactly what happened.

Ray777

shltter wrote:

You would not have to put the ticket back in the machine once the next bus came just tell the driver what happened if an inpector boarded the Bus to check tickets they have a ticket reader that would verify your story.

But what if the driver of the next bus has the same zero-tolerance approach towards customer service?

shltter

Ray777 wrote:

But what if the driver of the next bus has the same zero-tolerance approach towards customer service?

If you get an ignorant bastard stand your ground and demand that an inspector is called you have paid your fare end of story.

spareman

johnnyrotten wrote:

I hate it when you try to overtake a bus ,Stopped at bus stop, and the F€cker pulls out

I hate it when F€cker's dont let me pull out from stops, wonder how much time is wasted trying to pull out from stops everyday?
Hey maybe if there was a new rule that you must let buses pull out then all the problems of buses running late would be sorted!!!!
Hang on that rule is already out check the rules of the road book if you dont believe me:p

Slippin Jimmy

shltter wrote:

If you get an ignorant bastard stand your ground and demand that an inspector is called you have paid your fare end of story.

Now to be fair mostof the Dublin Bus staff are very nice and will try to help you. But do you wonder why they are so angry at times when you have muppets calling them bastards. It is disgraceful the way some bus drivers are treated. I have seen this once happening and heard about a few times aswell. This guy got on the bus, he looked a bit rough, he put his ticket in the machine. Then it beeped meaning the ticket was broken or it was used. The driver asked for the ticket so he could check, then the driver said that the ticket was used, and the fair was whatever. Then this person actually spat in the drivers face. Why should drivers put up with that and then have people calling them names?
People should get a bit of cope-on.

shltter

DonnybrookGhost wrote:

Now to be fair mostof the Dublin Bus staff are very nice and will try to help you. But do you wonder why they are so angry at times when you have muppets calling them bastards. It is disgraceful the way some bus drivers are treated. I have seen this once happening and heard about a few times aswell. This guy got on the bus, he looked a bit rough, he put his ticket in the machine. Then it beeped meaning the ticket was broken or it was used. The driver asked for the ticket so he could check, then the driver said that the ticket was used, and the fair was whatever. Then this person actually spat in the drivers face. Why should drivers put up with that and then have people calling them names?
People should get a bit of cope-on.

I never said that all Bus drivers were ignorant Bastards but there are some about trust me.
Are you alleging that the OP spat in someones face because if you are just saying someone did it and then that justifies any bus driver being a prick to any customer then you are wrong.
You don't treat everyone like **** because x number of passengers are rude to drivers

TempestSabre

I thought there was a shield in front of the driver?

Mimikyu

This post has been deleted.

Slippin Jimmy

TempestSabre wrote:

I thought there was a shield in front of the driver?

Well obviously the driver had to put down the shield to inspect the ticket. And just for the record most passengers have no respect whatsoever for bus drivers.

shltter

Solitaryman666 wrote:

This post has been deleted.

No the new ticket machines have no facility for printing transfer tickets

shltter

DonnybrookGhost wrote:

Well obviously the driver had to put down the shield to inspect the ticket. And just for the record most passengers have no respect whatsoever for bus drivers.

There is no need to have the screen up all the time or indeed any of the time.

It makes communication with passengers difficult it reflects the interior lights onto the windscreen and during the summer it considerably adds to heat in the cab.


And just for the record I am a Bus Driver and you are wrong I have very very few problems with passengers. I can only suggest that if most passengers are treating you poorly it is your own atitude reflecting back on yourself.
Of course there are arseholes out there and people have off days the same as drivers do but if you treat everyone as if they are going to be an arsehole then they probably will be.

Goodshape

Dublin bus is the most inept city transport system I've ever come accross. It's an embarisment imho.

shltter

Goodshape wrote:

Dublin bus is the most inept city transport system I've ever come accross. It's an embarisment imho.

Dublin Bus do a great job considering the level of subvention and investment if you want a better service then you are going to have to pay for it

Hagar

shltter wrote:

if you want a better service then you are going to have to pay for it

My mother always said "Good manners cost nothing".

The Bollox

DonnybrookGhost wrote:

Now to be fair mostof the Dublin Bus staff are very nice and will try to help you. But do you wonder why they are so angry at times when you have muppets calling them bastards. It is disgraceful the way some bus drivers are treated. I have seen this once happening and heard about a few times aswell. This guy got on the bus, he looked a bit rough, he put his ticket in the machine. Then it beeped meaning the ticket was broken or it was used. The driver asked for the ticket so he could check, then the driver said that the ticket was used, and the fair was whatever. Then this person actually spat in the drivers face. Why should drivers put up with that and then have people calling them names?
People should get a bit of cope-on.

pfft that's nothing compared to the poor bastard who got pissed on through the periscope thing they use to look behind. yer man un-srewed the glass piece and pissed down it. rotten scumbags

Goodshape

shltter wrote:

Dublin Bus do a great job considering the level of subvention and investment if you want a better service then you are going to have to pay for it

But it's not doing a great job at all. I really don't understand why that's acceptable or tolerated.

I've been living in the city now for the past several months and have to use the bus on occasion -- not ONCE has any bus I've waited for arrived even nearly on time. More often than not I'm left waiting at a bus stop while a number of timetabled arrivles come and go with still no sign of a bus.

And any dubliners I've spoken to about that seem to take the opinion that the timetables are just there as some sort of joke - wtf? so what am I suppoed to do when I need to GET somewhere? Like to work, to pay taxes, to pay for this bloody 'service'?

You simply can't rely on it to get you anywhere you need to go in my experience. And that's all before you have to deal with ignorant drivers and staff (which, to be fair, in my experience have never seemed too ignorant).

shltter

Goodshape wrote:

But it's not doing a great job at all. I really don't understand why that's acceptable or tolerated.

I've been living in the city now for the past several months and have to use the bus on occasion -- not ONCE has any bus I've waited for arrived even nearly on time. More often than not I'm left waiting at a bus stop while a number of timetabled arrivles come and go with still no sign of a bus.

And any dubliners I've spoken to about that seem to take the opinion that the timetables are just there as some sort of joke - wtf? so what am I suppoed to do when I need to GET somewhere? Like to work, to pay taxes, to pay for this bloody 'service'?

You simply can't rely on it to get you anywhere you need to go in my experience. And that's all before you have to deal with ignorant drivers and staff (which, to be fair, in my experience have never seemed too ignorant).

The vast majority of Dublin Buses services leave on time and the company meets the Service level requirements as set down by the Dept of Transport.

There are obviously a numbers of areas and times of the Day were due to the gridlocked traffic in this city buses are unable to run to timetable.

There is a solution to this it involves increasing the subvention getting more buses on the street (the 300+ that were promised 6 years ago would be a start) and adjusting the timetables were needed. It is not rocket science but our government would prefer to waste 60 million euro on E voting machines or 150 million on payroll systems for the health service that dont work. A new double decker bus costs about 250,000 euro.

shltter

Hagar wrote:

My mother always said "Good manners cost nothing".

I dont believe the poster was complaining about manners but your mother was correct.

BTW I tought your post on Irish Ferries in politics was very funny ( the link to the OP other posts)

Goodshape

Yea. I do think it's a bit unfair to be discussing this in a thread about 'ignorant bus drivers' as it has very little to do with them - gridlock is right, but a little bit of foresight at a managerial level could have gone a long way. Even something as simple as actually accounting for this constant gridlock on the bus timetable would be a start.

It seems to be that they're really struggling to catch up with what dublin has become in terms of size and density. I certainly don't envy the task of sorting it out.

Hagar

@ shltter. Thanks, I just couldn't resist it, the wee fu(ker got up my nose.

shltter

Goodshape wrote:

Yea. I do think it's a bit unfair to be discussing this in a thread about 'ignorant bus drivers' as it has very little to do with them - gridlock is right, but a little bit of foresight at a managerial level could have gone a long way. Even something as simple as actually accounting for this constant gridlock on the bus timetable would be a start.

It seems to be that they're really struggling to catch up with what dublin has become in terms of size and density. I certainly don't envy the task of sorting it out.

Yeah perhaps a separate timetable for the winter when the traffic is chronic would help but i could see the uproar if they produced a timtable and the gap went from 10 minutes during the summer to 30 or more during the winter although at least it would be realistic


And yes they are struggling considering we have pretty much the same number of buses we had 10 or more years ago and this city is nothing like it was 10 or more years ago.

SickCert

SpittingImage wrote:

it's worth complaining about but unfortunatetely, this rudeness and downright wanker behaviour stems from the top down. The inspectors are rude and hostile aswell.

I would have to agree with this statement.
The radio manner to us drivers from these CAPS are just downright sarcasm filled. I cannot explain drivers actions myself.
But i believe this stop should have a stance inspector like other heavy loading stops in the city.

There is no need to have the screen up all the time or indeed any of the time.

This is a condition of assault pay being paid.

Slippin Jimmy

And yes they are struggling considering we have pretty much the same number of buses we had 10 or more years ago and this city is nothing like it was 10 or more years ago.

I could be wrong about this, but I think that Dublin Bus have increased their fleet a lot over the last 5 or 6 years. At the moment Dublin Bus are getting 20 more buses, 2 have been delivered so far and the rest are still to come. I do agree that the city is very busy, but the thing about it is, it doesn't matter how many new buses Dublin Bus gets, if the people don't leave there cars at home and use public transport then the problem will still be there.

Hagar

Chicken and egg I'm afraid, people can't stop using cars unless the buses are already there.

Slippin Jimmy

Hagar wrote:

Chicken and egg I'm afraid, people can't stop using cars unless the buses are already there.

The buses are there, but people will not use them. Maybe when or if they bring in the congestion charge then people might think twice about taking their car to the city.

Solair

Maybe they should look at making the busses as comfortable as a car. The current busses lack comfort and more imporantly air.

When they're full to crush-level they are extremely unpleasant, lack any form of ventilation never mind air conditioning and generally whiff.

How about some nice new busses with good ventilation and climate control? maybe some seats that don't give you back ache!

Slippin Jimmy

Solair wrote:

Maybe they should look at making the busses as comfortable as a car. The current busses lack comfort and more imporantly air.

When they're full to crush-level they are extremely unpleasant, lack any form of ventilation never mind air conditioning and generally whiff.

How about some nice new busses with good ventilation and climate control? maybe some seats that don't give you back ache!

I must agree the newer buses are not as comfortable as the old ones. But there are only so many passengers allowed to be standing in the lower saloon of the buses, they are not really that bad. They could improve the air conditioning alright. But if this congestion charge is introduced then, I think a lot of people will use the buses.

Alun

Personally I use the bus to get into town because a) I'm a blow-in and I don't know my way around the maze of central Dublin and b) it's cheaper when you take car-parking charges into account.

That having been said, I find the whole experience not only rather frustrating (timetabling and timekeeping being the major issues), but distinctly unpleasant. The buses are dirty, smelly, either waay too cold, or waay too hot, and lurch about as if the driver was trying to deliberately make all the seated passengers travel-sick (which I frequently am, especially when seated upstairs), or make all the standing passengers fall over.

Slippin Jimmy

The only reason buses are dirty are because of the people who use them, but if Dublin Bus were to take every dirty bus off the road to be cleaned out then they would never run at all. They do however clean out the buses at night time. As for feeling sick, maybe you are not able to sit upstairs. I know people who can't sit in a certain direction in buses without feeling sick. I am sure the bus driver does not want the passengers to fall over. Could you be more specific in your post, what do you mean, do you mean he does it deliberatly, or how.

HSo

Dublin Bus has always pissed me off - for the last Twenty five years! I could give you many stories of buses skipping stops in the City Centre early in the morning by going from Ringsend Garage straight to Dolphin's Barn via the drivers own personal route, to feckers who would change the sign to out of service so that they would have to pick up any more passangers late at night. For years I suffered at the hands of selfish B###ards at the wheel and got fed up and bought a car many years ago to escape. Long live private transport! Because in this city public transport is a joke. I would pay any congestion charge so long as I could use my own dependable transport.

Slippin Jimmy

HSo wrote:

Dublin Bus has always pissed me off - for the last Twenty five years! I could give you many stories of buses skipping stops in the City Centre early in the morning by going from Ringsend Garage straight to Dolphin's Barn via the drivers own personal route, to feckers who would change the sign to out of service so that they would have to pick up any more passangers late at night. For years I suffered at the hands of selfish B###ards at the wheel and got fed up and bought a car many years ago to escape. Long live private transport! Because in this city public transport is a joke. I would pay any congestion charge so long as I could use my own dependable transport.

Look maybe one or two bus drivers might have done this years and years ago. But it is nearly impossible to get away with these sort of things now because of all the security cameras that the buses have. All bus drivers are not like this, most of the are very pleasent. Please don't refer to them as "B###ards", they are not all like that. There is more transport in the city than just buses, for example the Luas or if you wanted to splash out there are the taxis.

seatleon2000

I disagree .. most of em are plain ignorant

Slippin Jimmy

seatleon2000 wrote:

I disagree .. most of em are plain ignorant

Maybe one or two might be ignorant. Maybe some have had a bad day. But not all of them are ignorant. People just have a general opinion the drivers like to come late to the stop's, this is not the case as they are as eagar as the passengers to keep on time. Some people are ignorant to drivers for being late, this should not happen but it does.

shltter

SickCert wrote:

This is a condition of assault pay being paid.

No it is not it has been brought to the Labour court by a driver ( without union assistance) and the labour court ruled that due to the various faults with the screen including Heat in the cab area, the impediment to communication with passengers, the reflection on the windscreen and others that a driver could not be denied assault pay if s/he had the screen down.
The HSA had ruled that a screen capable of opening had to be installed in the bus as opposed to the previous fixed screen the Labour court ruled that the company was in breach of the HSA ruling by forcing drivers to drive with the screen up effectively making the screen a fixed screen.

The unions will not inform drivers of this because they were embarrassed because they took the companies side and played no part in the labour court ruling.

The company accepted the Labour Court ruling and paid the driver in question
however divisional managers will still refuse to pay assault but mention the labour court ruling and threatening to involve your solicitor will bring a change of heart.

shltter

DonnybrookGhost wrote:

I could be wrong about this, but I think that Dublin Bus have increased their fleet a lot over the last 5 or 6 years. At the moment Dublin Bus are getting 20 more buses, 2 have been delivered so far and the rest are still to come. I do agree that the city is very busy, but the thing about it is, it doesn't matter how many new buses Dublin Bus gets, if the people don't leave there cars at home and use public transport then the problem will still be there.

No they haven't the new Buses have just replaced the scrapped KDs KCs and RHs

Slippin Jimmy

shltter wrote:

No they haven't the new Buses have just replaced the scrapped KDs KCs and RHs

Ok thanks for pointing that out to me.

shltter

DonnybrookGhost wrote:

The buses are there, but people will not use them. Maybe when or if they bring in the congestion charge then people might think twice about taking their car to the city.

No the Buses are not there DB has very little spare capacity at peak times you cannot expect people to leave the car at home until the public transport is there nor could you punish them until you can provide an alternative.

DB would need at least 50% more buses spread over existing and new routes just to provide a decent service that might entice people from cars and alot more than 50% increase before you could contemplate congestion charging.

You cannot convince people that they should change when they sit in their cars and see full buses leaving 20 or more people standing at Bus stops along QBCs every morning.
When they see people being picked up more or less straight away and more Buses on the roads they might start to consider it.

SickCert

shltter wrote:

No it is not it has been brought to the Labour court by a driver ( without union assistance) and the labour court ruled that due to the various faults with the screen including Heat in the cab area, the impediment to communication with passengers, the reflection on the windscreen and others that a driver could not be denied assault pay if s/he had the screen down.
The HSA had ruled that a screen capable of opening had to be installed in the bus as opposed to the previous fixed screen the Labour court ruled that the company was in breach of the HSA ruling by forcing drivers to drive with the screen up effectively making the screen a fixed screen.

The unions will not inform drivers of this because they were embarrassed because they took the companies side and played no part in the labour court ruling.

The company accepted the Labour Court ruling and paid the driver in question
however divisional managers will still refuse to pay assault but mention the labour court ruling and threatening to involve your solicitor will bring a change of heart.

I like the sound of this.
Is there any record of this case? There was a recent case of this (last year) and the poor lad had to fight for his entitled money.
We need more than a message board forum before a DM is taken on.
We are always told the onus is on the driver for grounding a bus with defective assault screens, but as you may guess the inspectors laugh over the radio at you.

Hagar

I always thought that Inspectors were promoted from within the ranks ie were once drivers themselves.

Surely if that were true they would be more sensitive to drivers' problems?

SickCert

Hagar wrote:

I always thought that Inspectors were promoted from within the ranks ie were once drivers themselves.

Surely if that were true they would be more sensitive to drivers' problems?

I have to be careful here.
The last driver promoted was related to an inspector and on the same golf team.
As for the job description, some have a dont hassle me and bring your problem to someone else. Certain areas need monitoring by HQ but im not willing to say more on a web forum.

shltter

Hagar wrote:

I always thought that Inspectors were promoted from within the ranks ie were once drivers themselves.

Surely if that were true they would be more sensitive to drivers' problems?

Unfortunately in the past particularly problem drivers were promoted to get them out of the way. I know it sounds stupid but basically if a guy was giving the manager grief if he ensured he was promoted he became someone elses problem.

In fairness this does not really go on as much now but obviously guys who were promoted in this way are still around.

There is also what is refered to as pull so related to someone in the right golf club, GAA club, FF cumman, etc

That is not to say that all Inspectors are promoted that way and there has been a move away from that in recent years but it is galling when you are dealing with some gob****e who got the job because his brother in law works in head office and who is incapable of doing the job he has been promoted to.

markpb

DonnybrookGhost wrote:

As for feeling sick, maybe you are not able to sit upstairs. I know people who can't sit in a certain direction in buses without feeling sick. I am sure the bus driver does not want the passengers to fall over. Could you be more specific in your post, what do you mean, do you mean he does it deliberatly, or how.

Anyone who has used DB regularly will tell you how uncomfortable a normal trip on a DB bus can be. Between drivers who lurch in slow traffic (not realising how uncomfortable it is for seated passengers and how dangerous is it for standing passengers), buses that have dodgy suspensions (27B seems particularly bad for this) and bus routes that cross speed ramps (17A through Ballymun *shudder*), it can be truly awful getting the bus.

I do think that DB buses feel uncomfortable/unwelcoming though. The aisle in the middle, which is usually jammed past the legal limit at peak times, can be a nightmare to navigate if you're attempting to get off the bus before the city centre/terminus. There also seems to be a large amount of buses with at least one row of faulty interior lights, making night/evening trips a unique experience.

shltter

markpb wrote:

There also seems to be a large amount of buses with at least one row of faulty interior lights, making night/evening trips a unique experience.

Lights are not faulty they are deliberately turned off because of the reflection on the windscreen

Particularly the early AV type up to 100 which have a different shape windscreen.