Diamond Bus North West

[gilesbus1]

RE: Diamond Bus North West

(10/07/2019 21:31)Mrboo Wrote:  With First Manchester he had to work with other Depot Managers from other Manchester units you can`t up wages or take cleaners out of being inhouse and you use the buses head office say you can have. with Diamond he maybe given more power or told you will do this and this.

Getting a replacement bus to a broken down bus to Leigh may take longer now but who knows they may keep a spare that is the taxi bus that is close to Leigh.

Fair point on some of that, however we already have between 1 and 3 Vantage buses frequently stored at Leigh Bus Station issue is though they never ever replace failed V2's with them only V1's

The other issue is that many staff are saying they will simply leave if they have to go to Rusholme therefore there simply won't be the drivers needed either, given that they will also need extra ones as well for the tenders they seem to have decided to keep as well, then we face the same again next time around as no other operator would be stupid enough to operate it from Rusholme, so the staff they now recruit will leave again. The best thing for Rusholme would have been to have past it back to the Fingland Family and for it to have been demolished in January then it could be ready for student accommodation now. God knows what shambles they will now make with selling Oldham? will they shove some of that in Rusholme as well? God knows why they simply don't just hand Vantage back considering the loss they are making on it, £3.5m per year based on the fact they signed up to a bad deal in order to undercut Arriva Merseyside who also wanted it, presume they would have operated it from St Helens.

My own thought is that First will be stripped of the contract, as folk who work in Manchester will simply start bothering Andy Burnham, lets not forget some of those who work in Manchester have good jobs and are powerful people. I am sure Andy Burnham has already warned First about working out of Rusholme, its just a shame Rotala didn't see sense to pass Atherton on to First Vantage and pull out of it on 12th August instead of end of August.

Running vehicles from Eccles is far from ideal, buses at Atherton should have been moved in batch en bloc to Bolton, Eccles is simply too far if a 132 goes wrong in Wigan Town Centre. But then Rotala have a knack at failing to operate the 132 and not letting anyone know, has happened to me twice before so imagine they simply don't care and won't bother to operate it as before, and I'm not a regular user of it, certainly couldn't use that for work, based on the fact its on an hourly frequency hardly can be two hours late for work.

However I am watching both sets of them and the slightest slip up and I will bother Andy Burnham and the local MP, so be warned any operator who thinks they can con me and others with poor service, and yes I will be watching from my car as well.