to think that when i paid for a bus pass for dd for school she should be able to get on it

[pramsgalore]

i am so i paid before the new school year £100 for a bus pass [freedom pass] so dd could catch the bus to school, instead of walking in the cold and wet and also safer by bus, 4 times now in the past 3 weeks the bus has been too full for her to get on, she has been forced to walk up and arrive at school late, they offer the service they should make sure they provide enough buses, these are buses that are laid on for the school run, it drops off at the school, i have phoned them up and given them a right ear bashing, awaiting the manager to phone me back

you should get on to the school as well - they will have someone who 'manages' the bus contracts - tell them the problem and they will apply pressure on the bus company from their end.

oh and YANBU! (my 2 wont take the bus in the morning because it's too rough - havent managed to sort that one out yet tho)

i have spoke to the school this morning to explain why she would be late, they are uninpressed as well, its a joke, the inspectors were only out the other day because the local cafe phoned then [is behind the bus stop] to say the bus never picked the dc's up again. they are fully aware of the problem, they are quick to take your money and offer the service, but don't seem to be able to do the job.

Ring your education service. I'm in Northern Ireland, its education and library board here and I got an extra bus put on when my boys had bus passes and being left behind by the driver, on the grounds that they weren't "fare paying passengers"

I made the news and everything

i am not going to let this go, they have had £100 for my dd to get on a bus to school and they are dam well going to take her and pick her up, even if the manager has to come out in his car to do it

This used to happen to us all of the time when I was at school, so it's not new but it is completely unfair.

In the end we used to walk to a bus stop earlier on the route as it was still a lot closer than the school.

yes, but that kind of not the point, i paid for a service they are not providing, they need to put on more buses, they will know how many of these freedom passes they have sold and so should lay the correct number of buses

and i suspect the bus is already full at the bus stop before and the one after that, well she may as well walk to school.

It depends how the service is run. If it's a public bus route which just runs an extra bus around school time then I don't see that they have a responsibility to provide enough spaces. I had the same problem on a route I used to use regularly, I learned quickly that I had to get an earlier bus to guarantee getting on. And that it was likely to be worse if the weather was bad. It's a pain but that's life.

If they are contracted to provide a service for the school that's a bit different, and I would expect more of an effort to meet the demand.

Just because they've sold x amount of freedom passes doesn't mean they will have x amount of pupils on that day. You said it's been 4 times in three weeks, presumably that means 11 times when the bus has had enough space. Yes, they should perhaps try to run another bus, but if they did it might be empty a lot of the time.

they lay on a bus for the school children who have a freedom pass to catch, it only picks up school children and drops off at the school, thats what a freedom pass is, to get the dc's to school, when you apply you have to state what route they would be on, they can use it at other times, ie at weekends but not before a certain time, the whole point of the pass though is for school run

and if you paid £100 for a service and your dd was being refused it would you be happy

its not just my dd, there are alot of dc's not able to get on and not just one or two, they really do need to do something about it, or just don't offer a service they can not do

I can't believe that people are trying to justify this if you paid for a train ticket and that train never stopped for you because of over demand you'd complain. In fact I've read threads about airlines doing that very same thing. Why should it be any different for a child getting a school bus?

thankyou, exactly my point

its not like its a free service either, you have to pay for it

just spoke to the manager, well the dc's are not sitting down so the bus driver thinks he is full, they have been switching off the engine the odd time until they are all seated and then discovered there is room, errrr put an inspector on the bus and if they refuse to sit down, off the bus, do this everyday and be firm [yes i know unruly school dc's and all that].
told him this is an ongoing problem and needs to be addressed and not just to make excuses, to contact the school to get a true idea of how many and how often this is happening and to how many, in other words do your bloody job and stop answering my questions with an excuse.