Megabus or National Express?

avantra

I find driving to Manchester every two weeks making me very weary, so I decided to use the bus.

Here are the findings for last week:

I booked a roundtrip with Megabus based on the publicity they get here on the site from time to time.

Total for a Lon - Man return was £14.

1. Bus was 20 minutes late to leave Victoria as people who booked tickets on the same order were late so held up a long queue to get in the bus.

2. Very crowded, un-orderly queue (no e-tickets so some people had their ref number on a mobile phone and had to get the driver to look at it)

3. Smelly station but you do get a roof above your head

4. Notification to attach a colour coded tag to the luggage was given after many people already loaded their bugs (so they had to take it out and re-load again)

5. Return from Manchester: Bus left 48 minutes!! Late
6. Very small bus shelter outside, can only hold 6 people so everyone had to wait in the rain (it was pouring on Tuesday)
7. Air condition wasn't working very well.

Now, I am going to try National Express as I can travel on the funfair for £2 return from London and you do get proper bus stations at both ends.

How is your experience with NE?
I see someone here said that they are rude but than this hardly matter when you are late 48 minutes to depart like Megabus.

I will appreciate any opinion as I am going to do this trip a lot in the near future.

Capyboppy

I have used National Express quite a few times, as has my daughter on her own from aged 14 (she is now 15 and a half.) We have had no problems at all. On one occasion they must have over booked, but they just put another coach on to cater for all the extra passengers. That is something I suppose a smaller company wouldn't be able to do. If someone has experienced rudeness it must have been the odd ones, just like with anything you always get the odd bad experiences. On one of the "non stop" Manchester to London runs, the driver stopped at Banbury to change drivers. This was on an early run, and he said that if we wanted we could have a 20 minute break to go over to MacDonalds to get a coffee to take out, or other place. I think three quarters of the coach did this, and it was very much welcomed. Don't know if that is on every early run. We also took a "fun fare" to Leeds for £6 for the two of us. Again no problems. It was interesting to hear about your experiences of megabus as we did consider it for daughter. I don't think I would risk it now, especially when there are connections to get as well.

balsingh

I used National Express for 4 years throughout my university days. Lateness cant really be helped if there is traffic or an accident but they generally used to leave the starting station on time. I'd not hesitate to use them again.

MORPH3US

I thought Mega Bus was £1 for any journey - how stupid am I?!?!

I went on NI from Chester to London once, was a really bad journey because I don't sleep well on busses and when i'm tired and can't sleep I get really fidgety and annoyed with myself.

Would much rather do the train but then I suppose NI was bearable and a lot cheaper too!

M

BobToo

MORPH3US wrote:

I thought Mega Bus was £1 for any journey - how stupid am I?!?!

Not quite, Megabus has £1 tickets on every journey. I'm not sure how they allocate the £1 tickets, on my Dundee to London trip the website was quoting £6 and £4 when I was thinking about it but £1 when I had decided to go.

In my opinion it becomes much less of a bargain once the ticket price gets into double figures.

rammster

bargain or no bargain, megabus is best avoided. Travelled with National Express, never had a problem. did a 3 hr ride from bristol to London with megabus , Should be banned as is substandard compared to any public transport carrier. Should have its license of company cancelled. LOADS OF SH*TE!

lamnicholas

BobToo wrote:

Not quite, Megabus has £1 tickets on every journey. I'm not sure how they allocate the £1 tickets, on my Dundee to London trip the website was quoting £6 and £4 when I was thinking about it but £1 when I had decided to go.

In my opinion it becomes much less of a bargain once the ticket price gets into double figures.

The £1 fares are quota controlled. There may only be a few on each journey, once these are sold the price rises to £2 etc.