-AND the biggest competition is driving your own car or renting a car. you are on the exact same roa

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Lee, an accountant from Pasadena, Md., was part of a group traveling to New York for the Macy s Thanksgiving Day Parade. Her friends, Dan and Jacqueline Childs, who had each paid Megabus $89 for their round-trip bus fare, were turned away when they tried to board the motorcoach because there wasn t enough room.
Bus complaints are almost non-existent, at least compared with airlines. That doesn t make sense, since when it comes to customer service, buses are lightly regulated by the federal government. The real reason behind this absence of passenger discontent may hold the key to making other parts of the travel industry better luxury travel private driver europe and more complaint-free.
I receive only a handful of gripes about bus service every year. They re almost always resolved lightning-fast. So when I contacted Megabus about Lee s friends, I wasn t surprised to hear back from company spokesman Sean Hughes almost immediately.
How did the decidedly unglamorous bus industry get so attuned luxury travel private driver europe to its customers? Transporting about 80 million passengers a year while keeping them happy is no small achievement. It may explain the unprecedented expansion of city-to-city express carriers. They grew 2.1% in 2014, while the number of flights dropped 3% during the same period, luxury travel private driver europe according to new research.
People can see clearly luxury travel private driver europe why delays occur, like traffic or bad weather, so there is more understanding when things go wrong, he says. Bus travel is cheaper than other modes of transportation, which affects passenger expectations. You get exactly what you paid for: scheduled bus carriers have on-time ratings that exceed 90%, Schwieterman says.
Another thing: If you run a bus company, you can t run away from your customers. You know that you have to offer a good product at a fair price, says Dan Ronan, a spokesman for the American Bus Association, a trade association. If you re a passenger on a medium-size bus line, such as C J, which offers service luxury travel private driver europe between New Hampshire, Boston and New York, it s not uncommon to see the company s president, Jim Jalbert, in the parking lot.
Surprisingly, the government isn t forcing buses to do the right thing. The U.S. Department of Transportation luxury travel private driver europe s (DOT) Federal luxury travel private driver europe Motor Carrier Safety Administration, which oversees the motorcoach industry, is primarily focused on safety issues. In 2013, it conducted almost 40,000 bus inspections and shut down more than 100 unsafe bus companies. The department issued rules that required lap and shoulder seat belts for each passenger and driver seat on new motorcoaches and other large buses. It ordered improvements on the structural design of large buses, luxury travel private driver europe so passengers are better protected luxury travel private driver europe in the event of a rollover crash.
For interstate bus carriers, federal law is largely silent on service questions, addressing disability access, compensation for lost luggage and ticket sales. That s a dramatic contrast luxury travel private driver europe to the commercial aviation industry, which is practically stalked by the DOT with rules and regulations. Apart from the marked differences in service culture between the motorcoach and airline industries, it s a function of the mode of transportation, experts say.
Still, a bus, like a plane, transports you from point A to point B. Why do buses not need the heavy hand of government to tell them what to do? Simple, industry watchers says. There s more competition, says Robert Turner, a bus industry consultant in San Diego. There are hundreds of bus operators in the USA, compared with three monopolistic airlines, so a bus line can t afford to offer bad service.
As airlines embrace bizarre five-class configurations that promise to make air travel even more unbearable for all but a privileged few, many passengers refer to planes as buses with wings. That s meant as an insult to airlines, but it actually offends the bus industry. The newest motorcoaches don t just have government-mandated seat belts. They also come with bigger seats, onboard entertainment, wireless Internet connections and galley kitchens where you can microwave your dinner on the way home.
Complain directly to the company. Most customer-service problems can be resolved quickly and in real time. Lost baggage is usually found quickly, and ticket refunds are processed fast. Larger bus lines have websites where they accept complaints, but it rarely gets to that point.
Switch to a competitor. Motorcoach operators are flourishing in the USA, so there are many competing bus lines that would be happy to have your business. luxury travel private driver europe Don t waste your time with a bus company that doesn t appreciate your patronage — if you can even find one.
Christopher Elliott is an author, journalist and consumer advocate. You can read more about him on his personal website or contact him at *protected email* . Got a question or comment? You can post it on the new forum .
Buses are great for intercity travel. I went from Hampton, VA to DC for a vacation for $2.50 round trip, and didn t have to worry about DC traffic or pay $20 a night to store my car in the hotel garage. I wouldn t want to travel cross country by one, but for smaller trips they re great.
-AND the biggest competition is driving your own car or renting a car. you are on the exact same roads for the exact same amount of time. yes a bus is cheaper because you don t pay for gas or rental fees, but if you run the risk of not having a seat bad publicity is bad.
i have heard so many bad things about buses; will loose your seat, will leave you at a closed bus station to wait for a connection, and of course the crazy drivers who quit int he middle of a trip. so i can see why , if possible, the bus companies want to create some good karma.
luxury travel private driver europe It is so nice to read such a positive story about the mostly luxury travel private driver europe trouble-free motorcoach industry. Most of the time I travel by motorcoach it is a pleasurable experience, and I am able to avoid the indignities of air travel. Rarely do I experience the arguments relating to passengers reclining their seats too far, or have to deal with the groping by TSA agents. The largest problem I see is that the country s largest scheduled motorcoach operator, Greyhound Lines, is so large and spread out that it is not always able to keep on top of its service quality and customer responsiveness as much as the smaller, regional carriers. As a result, luxury travel private driver europe when given a choice between Greyhound Lines and someone else, I usually choose someone else. A secondary problem is that bus lines do not generally take charge luxury travel private driver europe of checked baggage for an entire luxury travel private driver europe itinerary, leaving it up to passengers to claim and recheck baggage at connection points (sometimes requiring passengers to safeguard their baggage for lengthy luxury travel private driver europe time periods if there are long connections at intermediate points). But these are mostly minor issues in an otherwise civil means of travel.
If an airline did the EXACT same thing to some customers (bumping passengers, and then only coughing luxury travel private driver europe up a clearly due refund when you contact them) you d be complaining about how terrible they are. Why the double standard?
to regular customers going through the normal channels. The fact that they have a responsive PR department is not quite so useful for most customers, and not a standard by which a company should be judged.
I just took Greyhound from Boston to New York City and back, express for $24. The bus was clean, quiet and comfortable. luxury travel private driver europe I had one little glitch at the start of my trip, which was resolved by Greyhound by getting me to NYC an hour BEFORE my original arrival time. Never had service like that on any airline.
Is it better by bus? Short answer is no, IMHO. For trips under twelve hours, luxury travel private driver europe bus may be O.K. but rail (Where available) is a far better option than both bus and air. However, long haul bus travel is miserable and time consuming. I suppose if time isn t a factor bus travel may be O.K. for some people looking to save a few bucks.
I remember my freshman year of college I took an express bus home for a few weekend visits. I will say, it was much better than air travel. I couldn t sit that long for a long trip, but for a few hours definitely worth it.
And how did they get back to MD? Did Megabus offer them another, later bus? Another carrier? Or, did they have to fend for themselves? If so, besides luxury travel private driver europe the eventual refund (after Chris got involved), luxury travel private driver europe did Megabus have to pay any difference in fares, or just what the original fare was? They could have taken Amtrak, a plane or another bus carrier back to MD at a higher fare, if one was available. luxury travel private driver europe Did they have to overnight in a hotel in NYC and take the next days Megabus? A lot of unanswered questions to this story.
They exist. Around here in Orlando some of the tour buses have seats so close together that normal adults cannot sit in them. The adults have sit diagonal across two seats. The poor seating buses exist and it is only a matter of time before the distance carriers discover them.
In the Northeast, bus travel between DC and points north is cheap, easy and hard to beat. I agree, when faced with a choice between Greyhound or another line, I usually choose the latter, but Greyhound is improving. In this area (DC) you have a choice of flying, driving yourself, taking a bus or taking the train and when comparing luxury travel private driver europe cost, time, effort and overall utility, bus often is the best. Been on great buses with wide comfortable seats with legroom, wifi, power plug and clean lav. Find that Amtrak is costlier than bus going northeast. If bus service luxury travel private driver europe of equal quality could get me to Chicago, I d have zero reason to fly. To Chicago Amtrak and Greyhound are about the same in price and time but at least 1/2 (if not better) of airfare. The money saved more than pays for the car rental.
luxury travel private driver europe I went 48 hours straight on buses from Tampa to Toronto. Even though it s a long haul; it was r