Beware The Bus!

If you are planning to travel by bus now or in the future, there are some things that you should be aware of. My husband is in "route" (I use that term very loosely) to Seattle from Idaho at this very moment. Since he doesn't like to fly, we thought that the bus would be a good solution. We were wrong though. Very wrong! Here's our story so far.

Eric decided to come home to Idaho, he has been in Washington State for medical treatment, for a couple weeks between procedures. He decided to take the bus because, as I stated, he prefers not to fly. Even though it meant almost 23 hour travelling, he was ok with that. He had plenty to keep him busy on the trip (books, music, pod casts, etc...).

The trip started out on a bad foot. His first bus left Seattle over an hour late. We thought, oh well, this is your glitch for this trip. Not so. He had to make 3 transfers to get home. The first one went ok, but when he arrived in Butte, Montana the route was cancelled due to the snow.

Travelling by bus in the winter through the mountains you have to expect that sort of thing. No big deal. The local Churches in the area were wonderful and brought in food and beverages for stranded travelers. Eric hunkered down and slept at the bus station till morning when the busses started running again. He finally arrived at his final destination about 10 hours late but he got here. We were thrilled to see him too!

Fast forward a couple weeks to last night. We put him on the bus at 11:45pm (Friday) and he was to arrive in Seattle today (Saturday) at around 5:30pm. Much quicker trip. We were very glad to hear that he wouldn't have to travel for as long. Plus, with all the sun that we have had, snow delays would not be a problem this time. Ignorance is bliss, right?

He arrived in Butte at around 3:30am and he was scheduled to depart again at 5:40am. All the passengers waited, and waited, and waited for the bus to arrive. Once the bus was 2 hours late, the bus station employee started making phone calls trying to find out what had happened and when to expect it to no avail. The passengers were told that they weren't able to reach anyone to get any information. So, everyone just kept waiting. Some people called family members to come and pick them up after several hours with still no ETA.

Finally, enough was enough! Eric started making phone calls and so did I the bus at this time was 5 hours late). He called the original ticket issuer in town and I called the bus line directly. Since Greyhound Lines does not come here, Eric had to transfer to two other bus lines that they contract with, Jefferson Lines and Salt Lake Express. It was Jefferson Lines that dropped the ball, Salt Lake was fine. 

Eric found out from the bus station back in Idaho that they had just found out that the route had been cancelled. Evidently, it was due to a driver walking off the job. They had not sent a replacement to cover the route but the next scheduled bus would be arriving at 6:40pm. 13 hours after their original departure time!

I received the same departure time from the bus company but they would not tell me the reason for the delay. The route had been cancelled at Midnight, 15 minutes after Eric had left. When I advised the representative that my husband was physically disabled she was "sorry" but there was nothing she could do and no compensation to be made. She did assure me that he would only have a 1 1/2 hour layover in Missoula, MT though. He will arrive in Seattle at 7:30am on Sunday (we hope!). That will make it about a 32 hour trip! Yuck!

I will update this to let you know how the rest of the trip went for the friends and family reading this. I'm sure that he will get home safely, eventually!

The moral of this story is, think twice before you take a trip by bus! Here are some facts to chew on...

  * After visiting all of the related bus web sites, none of them guarantee anything! The arrival/departure times are an approximate only! If you have a schedule to keep or a plane to catch at the end, think again!

  * You will not be issued a refund or any compensation if your bus is delayed or cancelled. If you miss a connecting bus or flight you are out of luck. They don't care because they don't guarantee anything!

  * Don't travel over the weekend with Greyhound! Even though the busses are moving, their offices are closed! If you have a problem or get stranded somewhere there is no one to call! The customer service numbers tell you to call back during business hours Monday-Friday.

  *Don't assume that if you purchase a ticket with Greyhound Lines that you will be on one of their busses. They contract a lot of their routes to smaller companies and they don't guarantee the service provided by those contractors.

  * Greyhound Lines is not a member of The Better Business Bureau (BBB). They have been issued a C+ rating based on limited public information only. The generous rating is mostly due to the length of time that they have been in business and the fact that only 1516 complaints have been received by the BBB in the last 12 months (I suspect that most complaints go directly to Greyhound and they do not share that info with BBB since they are not members).

I apologize for the long rant, but this has been such a frustrating situation that I want everyone to be aware of what can happen when you travel by bus. This was a new thing for us and boy have we learned our lesson! Never again!

Next time he'll fly!

Tina :)

   
*** Disclaimer ***
The information stated in this article is based solely on personal experience with specific transportation providers listed. Information was also obtained from self stated company literature from their own web sites and employees. All statements are true to the best of my knowledge at the time of publishing this article. I am not responsible for misinformation published on said company web sites or stated by company representatives.