megabus discussion

SooTee_2

Travelling by night
I have the same problem getting to King's Lynn. OK to Cambridge then der "you'll have to wait 'til morning!! Very frustrating, as only other option seems to be to take car and pay for parking and petrol.

commuter

As a regular long distance bus user I have been well placed to observe the dramatic decline in the quality and reliability of service since the megabus 'takeover' of the formerly excellent citylink operations. This has now reached a point where many longstanding commuters are being forced to use their cars instead. Others have simply given up on commuting altogether and have taken less well paid jobs elsewhere.

Megabus now have a virtual monopoly of intercity services north of the border and are already starting to screw every last drop of profit out of the business. this takes two main forms - reducing costs and increasing prices.

On the cost side the megabus fleet seems to be extremely unreliable, with frequent breakdowns and other mechanical problems. Every spare minute has been removed from the timetable, with the result that one service I use every day has never yet run on time in over two months of operation. For comparison, the citylink service service it replaced has been late on two occasions in the previous 4 years. Many other services simply fail to appear and passengers with tickets booked for the missing service are forced to buy wait for the next service then, if there is room, buy another much more expensive ticket.

Driver retention and training is another important area of neglect. Experienced former citylionk drivers have been made redundant or are resigning in disgust. The replacements are then given little in the way of training and support. In one recent incident a new stagecoach driver nearly drove his double decker under a low bridge. On other occasions drivers have simply not known where they were going or how to get there. On every occasion the megabus response has been to blame the driver. However it is clear to everyone involved that the blame really lies with senior management of stagecoach

On the prices side, the adage about getting what you pay for has never been more true. If you cannot afford a 50% chance of significant delays then do not consider using megabus. However, if your time is not valuable then please do take advantage of the cheap fares while you can. The ticket machines on Scottish buses are already being reprogammed with new higher prices. Had I not seen the imcompetence of stagecoach/megabus management at first hand I might believe that they might invest more cash in the service. However, everything they have said or done since the takeover suggests the opposite is the case.

One useful tip is to make sure you use the megabus website if booking tickets online. Despite megabus in scotland now apprently being just a brand of citylink, the same ticket on the same bus may cost over 17 times as much on the citylink website as it does on the megabus site. Feel free to draw your own conclusions on what stagecoach are doing to the citylink brand, .

Final caveat - anyone travelling to or via Perth should check their journey details extremely carefully. Many so called direct buses will drop you at Broxden - a windy car park on the edge of the bypass, several miles from the town centre with little or no information or help available and often no way of getting to Perth except on foot. For anyone changing buses in Perth please also check where each bus stops. Many drivers are unaware of what connections are available from Perth bus station and what ones are available from Broxden. Get it wrong and you will have a long cold wait ahead of you.

melancholly

I don't personally know about megabus, but on my last trip with national express from london to nottingham there were tv screens with plug-in points to put in (the free) headphones with various comdedy/sports shows. We even arrived about 40 mins early! I've never had the tvs before with national express but the service and comfort ranked higher than the last time I flew trans-atlantic! If you can book early enough to get funfares, it's a pretty good service for £1 each way!

Copjunk2

My husband has used the Perth-Glasgow service since last easter and found it to be very reliable and extremely cheap. The buses are usually fairly new. I know that there have been a lot of complaints about the Edinburgh -Perth service since Megabus has amalgamated with Citylink but the local MSP is now involved and Megabus say they will look at sorting out problems. I used the Perth-Edinburgh service a number of times prior to the Citylink amalgamation and always travelled on good quality coaches and arrived on (or before) time.

Could be we get the best coaches in Perth as we all know where Mr Souter lives!

As a Moneysavingexpert we have saved c£250\month using Megabus rather than Scotrail.

khizman

used it once,
got me from a-b and thats all.

if the seats are £1 book 2 each, then you have more room

Titfield

Megabus uses a variety of vehicles:

Some are brand new state of the art neoplan double decker coaches - which cost a great deal of money.

Others are fairly old 10 years plus double decker buses albeit fitted with high backed seats. These buses (Leyland Olympians) tend to be fairly noisy and uncomfortable. There are also some single decker coaches (Volvo B10M) of advancing years - these are more comfortable than the old double decker buses but again are not in the same league as the brand new neoplans.

Im not sure how with any certainty you can tell which vehicles will be use don which route but Bournemouth certainly has the old variety,

sainthalo

COMPLAINT

I noticed some have complained to megabus about terrible journies - did anyone get a response from megabus? They ignored me completely and i posted and emailed it correctly so i know they got it. Im thinking of posting the complaint in this thread - it was really dangerous what happened.

smartperson

My recent experience of Megabus in Scotland was so bad that I would strongly recommend NOT using this service. The bus was an old double-decker, uncomfortable and with poor ventilation. The bus shook all the way from Aberdeen to Glasgow and slowed down noticeably on any uphill slope. The luggage facilities were inadequate and also slowed down the journey (as passengers struggled to retrieve bags from the front of the bus). This service has now merged with Citylink in Scotland, so there appears to be no way of choosing between a 'normal' comfortable coach service and an unpleasant one. The argument that 'you get what you pay for' doesn't hold here - it seems to be a lottery which service you get - and there appears to be no choice.

fudgem

We used Megabus in April this year, Leeds to London and back, total £4 for the two of us. Brand new bus both going and coming, no complaints whatsoever, would definitely use it again.

Some you win and some you lose, glad I was on the winning side for once:j

p1an0player

khizman wrote:

used it once,
got me from a-b and thats all.

if the seats are £1 book 2 each, then you have more room

Nice idea in principle but does it really work?
If you're on a packed bus with an empty seat next to you, and someone gets on and wants that seat, are you going to refuse that person the seat by saying that you paid for two?
Fair enough there should be another seat available for that person but it would be difficult for the person getting on the bus to know which of the empty seats were paid for and which were not.