This morning I drove the Bournemouth feeder bus – out of service to Bournemouth then two pick up points in Bournemouth, one in Ringwood and then on to Winchester where I hand the bus over. When it leaves Winchester the bus continues to London. The problem is this – passengers who book Bournemouth or Ringwood to Oxford, Coventry or Birmingham are expected to take this London bus as far as Winchester and then transfer to the Birmingham bus. The problem is that this is not clear on their tickets and, unlike National Express, we do not use route numbers on our buses which correspond to a route number printed on a ticket. Normally when I pull up at a stop there are people waiting and I call out that this is both the London and Birmingham bus which explains things. However, this morning my manifest listed 9 passengers as being booked from Ringwood (a mix of Birmingham and London) but when I pulled up at the stop there was not a single soul! The stop is in a Car Park and there were some cars there with people sitting in them – they stared at the bus but made no move to get out of their cars and come to the bus. National Express use the same stop and are scheduled there at the same time as me, 06:30.

What am I meant to do? Should I walk up to each car, tap the window and ask if they want Megabus or Nat Ex? Well, I didn’t. Although I was a minute past my due time there I sat there for a couple of minutes so anyone could come over if they wished and then closed the door and headed for Winchester. But I bet I left some behind who wanted my bus.