Bus Driver Pay

[TravelDream]

I thought this might be an interesting thread.

We all know bus driver pay in the UK isn't the best. It's not uncommon for drivers to be paid around the £10 mark and just than a quid above minimum wage. Even in London, there are drivers on not much more.

I was reading an article recently and was surprised to see that Dublin Bus proposed a driver salary increase to above £20 an hour as their basic salary plus premium and shift payments. With the changed conditions, the drivers actually voted against it.
''The proposals would see the introduction of a new composite pay rate of €23.50 per hour from next October, which would incorporate shift and premium payments for about 1,700 drivers with a five-over-seven-day contract – meaning they work two Sundays out of every five. This would equate to about €916 for a 39-hour week.''

Dublin Bus drivers offered 15% pay rises in return for big work practice changes

Management plan would reassign drivers from specific routes to multiple ones

www.irishtimes.com

In New York, back in 2016 MTA Bus drivers earned between $20.97 an hour for new starters and $31.79 per hour before overtime dependent on experience. That's £15 to £23 per hour.
There was a driver in 2016 who earned over £100,000 with overtime. Yes, a driver, not a manager or anything.

NYC’s highest-paid bus driver doubled his salary with OT

New York’s highest-paid bus driver, Jeffrey Birch, 60, collected $153,173 last year, more than doubling his $67,462 base salary, MTA payroll records show. Explaining the windfall, Birch told The Po…

nypost.com

Even in Hong Kong, long a bastion for very low salaries for manual workers like drivers, NWFB and Citybus are offering £12 an hour for new starters.
''For full time positions we will offer a permanent employment contract with just 6 months’ probation. We will also offer an attractive hourly package with $125 per hour and potentially earn up to $25,000 per month.''

Bus Captain Application Form | Citybus e-Form

Citybus Bus Captain Application Form

www.bravobus.com.hk

Driver salaries seem to vary dramatically around the world, even in places where the cost of living is comparable.
Are drivers here underpaid/ drivers there overpaid or is it to difficult to compare salaries across borders? I don't know. What are your thoughts?

 

[Geordie driver]

My local firm, Go NorthEast is looking for drivers. They won't tell you the hourly rate in vacancy adverts, but after a bit of digging I found it was £9.08 an hour. Most drivers who have been there a while will be on about 12 quid an hour but the conditions are often horrendous, with shifts driving right to the max of legal hours. There is a massive shortage of drivers, and I wouldn't touch it with a barge pole now. HGV 2 is the way to go.
Edit by Geordiedriver,
For some reason my thread has been edited to include the words " in vacancy adverts", whilst this is so, the won't even tell you the hourly rate if you ask them. My direct experience.

 

[Kremlin Stooge]

''The proposals would see the introduction of a new composite pay rate of €23.50 per hour from next October, which would incorporate shift and premium payments for about 1,700 drivers with a five-over-seven-day contract – meaning they work two Sundays out of every five. This would equate to about €916 for a 39-hour week.''

Whew! Are they recruiting? Quick, get me on the next plane to Dublin!!

More seriously, and after reading the linked Irish Times article, I must admit I never understood the mindset of some drivers who only wanted to do one or two routes. I made it my business to know all the routes out of my depot, plus one or two others. Not from a point of professional pride, but the rather more earthy and mercenary approach of the more routes I knew, the more chances of a piece of overtime coming up!

<chorus>Grabber!!!</chorus>

 

[Simon75]

*note I've have no experience in the bus/coach industry *
What I can gather pay can vary from depot to depot, and even driver to drivers (based on if a driver has been TUPE)

TUPE = Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment

 

[busesrusuk]

Having spent most of my career in the industry recruiting bus drivers, it amazed me how drivers always focussed on the hourly rate and not the overall package and what you will likely earn at the end of the week.

There are so many ways to cut the cake in terms of pay but its the hourly rate that is the "be all and end all" for a lot of people. They call, you tell them the hourly rate (as that is normally the first question for a licence holder who are normally chasing the pound) and ring off before you get to explain the whole package.

In London, where I worked, the difference across all the companies was no more than £15-20 per week. It depends on paid breaks versus unpaid breaks, consolidated rates or rates that get enhanced for unsocial hours/weekends etc. but the end result is roughly the same.

It always amazed me that drivers were prepared to travel half way across London and add hours to their commute for an hourly rate that was higher but the weekly pay was no more than a tenner or so different.

I well remember one guy who moved out of London to Peterborough for family reasons and left to work with another operator. However, when he realised that he wasn't being paid for his breaks he wanted to come back.

So, he was prepared to drive the best part of 200 miles a day taking him up to 2 hours each way each day with all the drama of a long drive before and after a shift for the sake of about £50 per week. No matter how hard I tried to explain and suggest that he would be better off staying where he was and that he would likely knacker a car by doing upwards of 50,000 miles a year commuting as well as reducing his personal time to around 10 hours a day depending on length of shift, he still felt he would be better off(!).

The moral of the story for any wannabe bus driver is to hear and understand the whole package before making a decision and remember that in most companies there are extra benefits for staying put rather than continually moving around such as service related pay rises, additional holiday entitlements, sick pay etc.

To add some meat to the original posters question, bus drivers pay in the UK is probably lower than it should be but that's the market we are in. Also, with reference to rates of pay differing from garage to garage and driver to driver that is/was a feature of some companies. Most of the differences now (and I can only speak with any basis of fact on rates in TfL land) is down to service related pay scales, but one garage that I was responsible for had 27 different grades in the one garage due to how the company had tendered for work and ring fencing rates on individual routes. Took some time to resolve (this was back in the 90's) to the situation today where there are only six grades and all are based on length of service - you progress through the grades from year one to six when you get on to the top rate which in my company was about £16ph which based on our terms and conditions equated to about £650 per week. Please note, I no longer work there and they haven't settled their 2021 pay round so things could change .

 

[Geordie driver]

Having spent most of my career in the industry recruiting bus drivers, it amazed me how drivers always focussed on the hourly rate and not the overall package and what you will likely earn at the end of the week.

There are so many ways to cut the cake in terms of pay but its the hourly rate that is the "be all and end all" for a lot of people. They call, you tell them the hourly rate (as that is normally the first question for a licence holder who are normally chasing the pound) and ring off before you get to explain the whole package.

In London, where I worked, the difference across all the companies was no more than £15-20 per week. It depends on paid breaks versus unpaid breaks, consolidated rates or rates that get enhanced for unsocial hours/weekends etc. but the end result is roughly the same.

It always amazed me that drivers were prepared to travel half way across London and add hours to their commute for an hourly rate that was higher but the weekly pay was no more than a tenner or so different.

I well remember one guy who moved out of London to Peterborough for family reasons and left to work with another operator. However, when he realised that he wasn't being paid for his breaks he wanted to come back.

So, he was prepared to drive the best part of 200 miles a day taking him up to 2 hours each way each day with all the drama of a long drive before and after a shift for the sake of about £50 per week. No matter how hard I tried to explain and suggest that he would be better off staying where he was and that he would likely knacker a car by doing upwards of 50,000 miles a year commuting as well as reducing his personal time to around 10 hours a day depending on length of shift, he still felt he would be better off(!).

The moral of the story for any wannabe bus driver is to hear and understand the whole package before making a decision and remember that in most companies there are extra benefits for staying put rather than continually moving around such as service related pay rises, additional holiday entitlements, sick pay etc.

To add some meat to the original posters question, bus drivers pay in the UK is probably lower than it should be but that's the market we are in. Also, with reference to rates of pay differing from garage to garage and driver to driver that is/was a feature of some companies. Most of the differences now (and I can only speak with any basis of fact on rates in TfL land) is down to service related pay scales, but one garage that I was responsible for had 27 different grades in the one garage due to how the company had tendered for work and ring fencing rates on individual routes. Took some time to resolve (this was back in the 90's) to the situation today where there are only six grades and all are based on length of service - you progress through the grades from year one to six when you get on to the top rate which in my company was about £16ph which based on our terms and conditions equated to about £650 per week. Please note, I no longer work there and they haven't settled their 2021 pay round so things could change .

Very good post.

For those with experience of the industry we can find out what the best deals are, and you are right, the hourly rate is not the be all and end all. But for new starters it is difficult to find out, as I said up thread, they won't even tell you the hourly rate until you apply, never mind the shifts and conditions.

Round here is a choice of GNE, Stagecoach, Arriva, all paying almost exactly the same and with similar conditions.

The business model appear to be attract drivers, get them to pay for their own training, hammer them until they either accept it or leave after about 5 years, rinse and repeat.

There is not shortage of PCV drivers, there is a shortage of people with a PCV licence prepared to work for a pittance.

Bus driving jobs do not exist in a vacuum, HGV 2 with hiab will get you better money, hours and conditions for a far easier job.

 

[Christophe]

In the past I've made tentative enquiries about making the leap in to bus driving. What I've found echoes the above. In the good old North East, Go North East offer £9.04 starting for 39 hrs. Training is at minimum wage, then a £5 per week training bond deduction for however long, which you get back. There is no info on top rates, though I'm led to believe it's about £11.20 ish an hour though not at all depots. There is a pay award pending; small increments at the start, with one larger one at the end to get to top rate.

Arriva Durham starts at £9.20 for 36 hours, though again a pay award is pending and I did read somewhere it's due a significant increase in the next pay round. The top rate at Durham is around £10.40 ish, I think.

Arriva Northumbria starting rate is broadly similar, though based on 38 or 39 hours. I've seen mention of a top rate north of £12 per hour, though I've never been able to find anything official to support that.

Stagecoach Newcastle are fairly open, and quote £9.91 starting, then going up to £11.89 over 4 years. Again, a pay review is pending, though they now look to be offering training as an apprenticeship, so I'm not sure how that works.

I can't comment on sick pay/holiday pay as that's not easily available, though one would imagine they'd be broadly similar. Unpaid first day etc.

Paid breaks for newbies are thing of the past across all 3 from what I can find.

As a comparison, County Durham independent Scarlet Band are currently looking and offering £9.20 an hour. Gateshead independent Gateshead Central offer £11 according to their Facebook page, though at least part is made up of an attendance bonus.

One more point I forgot to add, I'm not aware of anything similar to the Licence for London so if you leave one company at the top rate of pay I assume you start at the bottom of the pile if you go to another?

 

[busesrusuk]

In the past I've made tentative enquiries about making the leap in to bus driving. What I've found echoes the above. In the good old North East, Go North East offer £9.04 starting for 39 hrs. Training is at minimum wage, then a £5 per week training bond deduction for however long, which you get back. There is no info on top rates, though I'm led to believe it's about £11.20 ish an hour though not at all depots. There is a pay award pending; small increments at the start, with one larger one at the end to get to top rate.

Arriva Durham starts at £9.20 for 36 hours, though again a pay award is pending and I did read somewhere it's due a significant increase in the next pay round. The top rate at Durham is around £10.40 ish, I think.

Arriva Northumbria starting rate is broadly similar, though based on 38 or 39 hours. I've seen mention of a top rate north of £12 per hour, though I've never been able to find anything official to support that.

Stagecoach Newcastle are fairly open, and quote £9.91 starting, then going up to £11.89 over 4 years. Again, a pay review is pending, though they now look to be offering training as an apprenticeship, so I'm not sure how that works.

I can't comment on sick pay/holiday pay as that's not easily available, though one would imagine they'd be broadly similar. Unpaid first day etc.

Paid breaks for newbies are thing of the past across all 3 from what I can find.

As a comparison, County Durham independent Scarlet Band are currently looking and offering £9.20 an hour. Gateshead independent Gateshead Central offer £11 according to their Facebook page, though at least part is made up of an attendance bonus.

One more point I forgot to add, I'm not aware of anything similar to the Licence for London so if you leave one company at the top rate of pay I assume you start at the bottom of the pile if you go to another?

Like I tried to explain above, comparing hourly rates is like trying to compare apples with oranges - there are just to many variables to make a valid comparison. The question to ask is what my average weekly earnings will be and how many hours I will be working to get that weekly rate and what is the progression.

I think its reasonable to assume that the weekly earnings potential at each company is going to be broadly similar as they will be all to aware of what their competitors are paying. It is disappointing though to hear that companies shy away from giving details of potential earnings. Its the one thing that gets most people out of bed each day and is a very reasonable question to ask.

When it comes to sick pay, you will find that most companies will pay SSP from day 3, with no money for the first three days. Company sick pay is normally linked to service - once you have been there for a period of time you will receive company sick pay in addition to SSP but it is not usually the same as the average rostered weekly pay (sick pay is more than likely to be less than average rostered earnings). Holiday pay is now regulated and must reflect your average weekly earnings for the statutory minimum holiday entitlements (20 days plus the 8 BH's).

I very much doubt that any company outside of the TfL bubble would contemplate something like the Licence for London (LfL) agreement. Why on earth would any company consider entering into an agreement with its competitors that makes it easier for their staff to move to a competitor when staff are a scarce resource?

It only exists in London because the mayor believes he is an expert on everything to do with bus driving - reason for believing he is an expert is that his dad was a bus driver which he pronounces at every available opportunity. Although its probably as good as any qualification that a politician has(!).

The LfL agreement was brokered between the mayor, Unite and TfL with the companies having little say in the matter other than being given the job of turning it into a workable process. Its primary purpose is to enable staff to move between companies without having to revert to a year one rate of pay. The LfL will confirm their service and they are entitled to be put onto an equivalent grade that is available at the new company that reflects their service as if they had worked for that whole period at the company they wish to move to. There is no requirement or obligation to take an individual just because they have an LfL; they must pass any or all selection processes at the company they are applying to.

The LfL is issued subject to meeting certain criteria but it only relates to the rate of pay and does not cover any other terms such as holiday/sick pay entitlements which will be the same as a new entrant driver on year one rates; assuming of course that the company has service related pay scales.

However, the LfL agreement doesn't stop the companies offering other incentives to attract staff - something I took full advantage of during my tenure!

HTIOI

 

[Kremlin Stooge]

The moral of the story for any wannabe bus driver is to hear and understand the whole package before making a decision and remember that in most companies there are extra benefits for staying put rather than continually moving around such as service related pay rises, additional holiday entitlements, sick pay etc.

Absolutely this.

There is not shortage of PCV drivers, there is a shortage of people with a PCV licence prepared to work for a pittance.

True.

In the past I've made tentative enquiries about making the leap in to bus driving. What I've found echoes the above. In the good old North East, Go North East offer £9.04 starting for 39 hrs. Training is at minimum wage, then a £5 per week training bond deduction for however long, which you get back. There is no info on top rates, though I'm led to believe it's about £11.20 ish an hour though not at all depots. There is a pay award pending; small increments at the start, with one larger one at the end to get to top rate.

Arriva Durham starts at £9.20 for 36 hours, though again a pay award is pending and I did read somewhere it's due a significant increase in the next pay round. The top rate at Durham is around £10.40 ish, I think.

Arriva Northumbria starting rate is broadly similar, though based on 38 or 39 hours. I've seen mention of a top rate north of £12 per hour, though I've never been able to find anything official to support that.

Stagecoach Newcastle are fairly open, and quote £9.91 starting, then going up to £11.89 over 4 years. Again, a pay review is pending, though they now look to be offering training as an apprenticeship, so I'm not sure how that works.

I can't comment on sick pay/holiday pay as that's not easily available, though one would imagine they'd be broadly similar. Unpaid first day etc.

Paid breaks for newbies are thing of the past across all 3 from what I can find.

As a comparison, County Durham independent Scarlet Band are currently looking and offering £9.20 an hour. Gateshead independent Gateshead Central offer £11 according to their Facebook page, though at least part is made up of an attendance bonus.

One more point I forgot to add, I'm not aware of anything similar to the Licence for London so if you leave one company at the top rate of pay I assume you start at the bottom of the pile if you go to another?

The thing about advertising the flat hourly rate and the flat contracted week is it won’t give the full picture about matters like:

• How does overtime work? When does it start accruing?

As an example here, when I joined First in Bristol the flat week was advertised as 37 hours at the flat rate, but, because of how the schedules worked, there would never be a flat 37 hour week, always 38 + a bit or 39 + a bit, and all those hours above 37 would be paid at the overtime rate. A week of splits was guaranteed 41 hours pay, when the driving content would be no different to a week of earlies or lates, so that got 4 hours of overtime straight off.

• Late shift or split shift premiums

• Rest day working

• Sunday working - is it ‘inside’ or ‘outside’ the working week? Is there a Sunday rate enhancement?

This can vary according to the rota the driver is on. In my case I was on a “5 over 7” rota and that included a couple of mandatory Sundays every 5 weeks. At my depot the rolling 4-day week rota also included mandatory Sundays. Other rotas had Sundays as entirely voluntary.

Different companies, and indeed different depots will also have local agreements around working over Christmas and the New Year period, as well as other bank holidays.

So the upshot is, don’t necessarily be put off by the advertised hourly rate and the advertised hours, you would almost certainly be earning more than that, and if you were prepared to do say one rest day and one Sunday a month, plus a couple of pieces of out-of duty overtime, you would earn a good deal more.

As for whether drivers are paid well enough for the job, that is down to the market and will be partly reflected by geographic location. I see the North East mentioned in this topic; I guess the economic conditions there are somewhat different to Bristol, where there seems to be a chronic shortage of drivers because many other industries are competing in the same labour pool.

 

[Roger1973]

One more point I forgot to add, I'm not aware of anything similar to the Licence for London so if you leave one company at the top rate of pay I assume you start at the bottom of the pile if you go to another?

Again, there's no hard and fast rule, but I have seen pay scales with rates based on length of service where a new driver with existing PCV licence will either start a level or two up from a new driver who's been taken on as a trainee, or where they will progress through the grades a bit quicker.

 

[Robertj21a]

With the appalling rates of pay for a very demanding, and responsible, occupation, are there any major UK bus operators (outside London?) that **don't** struggle to recruit?

 

[Sm5]

Dont forget London in 2021 is a very different place to London of 2007… weve slipped down the global wealth chart quite a lot thanks to the falling exchange rate, that by counter kept many people in work albeit in 2007 salaries, but with higher inflation.

Other countries are now way ahead of us, not just in salary, but inflation and technology too.

I was surprised to find recently when recruiting IT staff, salaries in Manchester are lower than salaries in several cities in Poland, and not just by a few quid. I also found the costs of living an equivalent lifestyle in relevant cities were higher in Poland than Manchester too; naturally the Polish office didn't happen.

 

[geoffk]

As for whether drivers are paid well enough for the job, that is down to the market and will be partly reflected by geographic location. I see the North East mentioned in this topic; I guess the economic conditions there are somewhat different to Bristol, where there seems to be a chronic shortage of drivers because many other industries are competing in the same labour pool.

Here in Exeter I'm seeing a sudden increase in cancellations on city bus services. We (the bus user group) are trying to find out whether it's Covid-related, Brexit or an upsurge in drivers applying for better-paid HGV jobs - probably a combination of all three. We've seen on the news that a shortage of HGV drivers has meant empty supermarket shelves and other problems, and perhaps the haulage industry sees bus drivers as a potential solution. (Not sure why this under Trivia as it seems to be a serious issue!)

 

[the sniper]

Driver salaries seem to vary dramatically around the world, even in places where the cost of living is comparable.
Are drivers here underpaid/ drivers there overpaid or is it to difficult to compare salaries across borders? I don't know. What are your thoughts?

I'd imagine the strength of the unions in Dublin, New York and Hong Kong are a large factor.

Get organised or get shafted. No better time than now, the operators don't have a desperate pool of labour ready to flood in and undermine the current workforce, which was always seemingly the excuse for bus drivers not defending themselves.

 

[Geordie driver]

I'd imagine the strength of the unions in Dublin, New York and Hong Kong are a large factor.

Get organised or get shafted. No better time than now, the operators don't have a desperate pool of labour ready to flood in and undermine the current workforce, which was always seemingly the excuse for bus drivers not defending themselves.

The entire set up of the UK outside London industry is to set drivers against drivers. Add in the way union power has been ground down and it makes it very difficult to take effective action.

Post privatisation we had a gradual gaslighting in conditions and pay. Every year things got a little bit worse; a pay award would come but they would make the rotas worse. I think in 20 years I only once worked a rota that was in agreement. My thread about heaters on in the summer gives an idea of how the industry thinks it is ok to treat your customers and staff.

"The market" was massively skewed when they could import drivers en mass from eastern Europe. I can remember one manager actually bragging about how we were shafted.

As I said further up, bus driving does not exist in a vacuum, there are many easier jobs paying more now, not just driving, and most drivers have transferable skills.

Edit, I have just checked and according to the bank of England inflation calculator, what cost £1 in 1985 would now be £3.

In 1985 if I drove 40 hours a week I would clear £200. I doubt many drivers now are clearing £600 for 40 hours. Nearer 300 I believe.

In 1985 the highest fare in my county was 45p and you could travel from one side of the county to the other for that price, using more than one operator too.

3 x 45p is £1.35, that would get you about 3 stops round here.

 

[Kremlin Stooge]

Here in Exeter I'm seeing a sudden increase in cancellations on city bus services. We (the bus user group) are trying to find out whether it's Covid-related, Brexit or an upsurge in drivers applying for better-paid HGV jobs - probably a combination of all three. We've seen on the news that a shortage of HGV drivers has meant empty supermarket shelves and other problems, and perhaps the haulage industry sees bus drivers as a potential solution. (Not sure why this under Trivia as it seems to be a serious issue!)

Yes, and to add to the factors you listed, it is not just the HGV industry; the growth in light van deliveries, arising from greatly increased online shopping, has also drained the pool of potential and existing bus drivers. Plus, bus driving is not exactly the most healthy occupation, and some people will have developed conditions that render them particularly vulnerable to Covid, or indeed unable to receive a course of vaccination due to the nature of a particular condition.

 

[Starmill]

I've copied this from Go Ahead in Oxford:

PCV Drivers​

Pay Rate: Trainee - £11.43 ph. PCV holder and trained to Oxford Bus Company standards - £14.27 ph. PCV Coach Driver - £15.43 ph

We are recruiting full time PCV drivers to join our team! You will be able to deliver excellent customer care by providing a reliable bus service that transfers passengers safely and professionally.

You'll receive:

• Professional training (and be paid whilst you learn)
• Opportunities for overtime.
• A free travel pass for you, one other adult and children under 18.

Careers - Oxford Bus Company and Thames Travel

www.oxfordbus.co.uk

Not clear if there are any other benefits in the offing at overtime at flat rate of course. But a strong headline rate certainly.

Oxford of course one of the most expensive places in the country to live.in High Wycombe they pay a lower headline rate:

Title: PCV Driver
Hours: 40 hours per week guaranteed, usual week is over 45 hours. These may be subject to alteration and worked flexibly in order to sustain operational efficiency

Rates of pay: PCV holders
£10.50 per hour Monday- Saturday
£11.10 per hour Sunday
Trainees £8.28 per hour
£1 extra on all rates for rest day work (excluding trainees)
Reporting to: Senior Duty Manager
Job Purpose: Carry out driving duties for Carousel Buses in an efficient, effective and legal manner. Provide a reliable bus service that transfers passengers safely. Perform skilled driving in busy towns. Sale and promotion of full range of travel cards and tickets available

 

[CN04NRJ]

Wages are very good at Lothian, i'm still on the <2 year rate and single deck contract but it goes up to £13.18 after 2 and £14.18 after 3. Obviously Edinburgh is expensive to live in but I live in West Lothian where rents are *far* cheaper and it's only a ~20 minute commute to my garage without traffic - so Edinburgh wages but without the living costs.

Overtime enhancements obviously, some of the decker contract drivers are on astronomical money (I believe £21+ an hour for weekend overtime for example) and bonuses for working Sun/Sat in the same week along with their paid breaks etc.

 

[Kremlin Stooge]

Oxford of course one of the most expensive places in the country to live.in High Wycombe they pay a lower headline rate:

Wow, 15 years ago I was getting £11.40 for Sundays.

As for £1 extra per hour for a rest day, not a chance...

 

[notadriver]

It’s definitely not the time to be a PCV driver. HGV is the way to go. But if you must go PCV driving I would go for the closest depot with the widest choice of routes and the newest vehicles rather than chasing a few pence an hour.

 

[F Great Eastern]

Whew! Are they recruiting? Quick, get me on the next plane to Dublin!!

More seriously, and after reading the linked Irish Times article, I must admit I never understood the mindset of some drivers who only wanted to do one or two routes. I made it my business to know all the routes out of my depot, plus one or two others. Not from a point of professional pride, but the rather more earthy and mercenary approach of the more routes I knew, the more chances of a piece of overtime coming up!

<chorus>Grabber!!!</chorus>

DB deal was turned down, they've asked for political intervention:

‘No-one is listening’: Dublin Bus drivers ask minister to listen to concerns on work changes

Drivers say they may be forced to drive multiple different routes with a more unpredictable schedule.

www.thejournal.ie

This stands out

“Most of us here are senior drivers,” he said. “We pick these routes because they suited us and our family life.”

“I’ve done 30 years service and I’m going back to a junior status, which I think is totally wrong and most of the guys do too.”

 

[neilmc]

I worked for a year as a conductor for Metro Leeds in 1974/75. The hourly conductor rate was just over £1 per hour, slightly more for a crew driver and about 20% higher for a OPO driver.

However you had to take into account shift pay:

Saturday late shift and all day Sunday paid time and three-quarters.

Saturday early shift paid variable amounts depending how much of the shift was before midday.

Split shifts (which were all weekday) paid the spreadover which would be around four hours at standard overtime rate of time and a half, so an 8 hour split shift would effectively pay 14 hours.

The company relied on a lot of overtime, so you had a guaranteed sixth-day working which you had to actively cancel should you not want to do it. But it was always a split shift with the entire shift paid at overtime rate of time and a half, therefore netting 18 hours pay.

The best week on the rota was Sunday late, Monday late, Tuesday day off, Wednesday, Thursday and Friday all splits one of which was sixth day working, and Saturday late. This week paid over 80+ hours for working 48.

The snag was that there was no pay increase for seniority, you just got trained as a driver and eventually put on the OPO rota or, if you couldn't pass the driving test or were an old-timer crew driver, there was a senior rota with slightly better start and finish times. However at the time Torre Road has a joint crew-operated service with West Riding which went all the way out to Ledston Luck, the old-timers monopolised this rota because it gave city pay for a semi-rural service!

When I left and became a trainee computer operator my pay halved, and stayed lower than I could get "on the buses" for years. Don't think that would be said now. Also peak and evening services have plummeted so I reckon there are much fewer splits and lates.

 

[whoosh]

Bus Drivers earned better than average pay before privatisation. Now they earn less than average pay, and things like paid breaks or enhanced rates for overtime are less now than they used to be.

Someone upthread said about Eastern Europeans, and I remember reading a news article about an Arriva company targeting Eastern Europeans by recruiting them in their home country and paying to fly them over, then providing accommodation (detucted from wages) - all of which undermined anyone who was living here already and trying to hold onto their existing pay and conditions.

Really, with exception of the industrial unrest of the 1970's*, bus worker's real-term wages have been declining since the 1960's.
*Revolving door recruitment of the 1960's - people joined, and made as much as they could with massive amounts of overtime/fiddling by letting passengers pay half fare straight into their own pocket - no ticket and stuff the company - gave way to negotiating One Man Operation in the 1970's with greater productivity and more reliability of only needing one person to turn into work instead of two, to take a bus out on the road.
The halcyon days of the 30s 40s and 50s were long over with the rise of the car.

Tram Conductor on London Metropolitan Tramways was "The best paid blue collar job in London" of the 1920s and early 30s.

Should be far more pay for the unsocial hours, lone working, and responsibility.

 

[Geordie driver]

Possibly as a result of contributing to this thread, I am now seeing adverts for my local company who I used to work for. Just over a tenner an hour with the dizzying prospect of an extra 30p an hour on Saturdays and Sundays.

They don't mention conditions, shift lengths or overtime rates, nor will they tell you when asked, they just ask you to apply.

I have just read several articles on the BBC and also in the financial Times regarding the HGV driver " shortage", to be fair they don't follow the simplistic " blame Brexit" line that the companies put out.

Naturally the big companies are pushing the govt. to allow cheap foreign labour back in.

 

[duncombec]

They don't mention conditions, shift lengths or overtime rates, nor will they tell you when asked, they just ask you to apply.

I'm just picking your statement as the most recent mention, not to single you out for making it. I'm intrigued by the number of references here to wanting to know these things in advance, and wonder why it makes such a difference in the driving industry. Is it because of the widespread variety of terms and conditions that it can end up being what leads the choice between one employer and another?

I ask because I've never seen any of this information available in other sectors before: the retail industry doesn't tell you these things until you apply, the public sector operates on fixed payscales, and even salaried jobs tend to have a range, or 'to be discussed' should you be successful, and even where Salary is stated, you rarely get to know the details of things like holiday if and until you reach interview. Do HGV firms (including both smaller firms and larger distribution companies) or train companies tell you this before you apply?

Whilst not wanting to get in to the ins and outs of the various jobs (which has been done many, many times before), are there any retail firms that still offer enhanced pay for weekend/bank holiday working (I'm pretty sure my former employer doesn't, just treating them as "normal days"), or overtime (ditto, just "you're getting more money because you're working more hours)? It just seems standard to me that you apply first and get told what the deal is as part of the process, rather than were you to just ring them up and ask about the conditions of employment.

 

[Geordie driver]

I'm just picking your statement as the most recent mention, not to single you out for making it. I'm intrigued by the number of references here to wanting to know these things in advance, and wonder why it makes such a difference in the driving industry. Is it because of the widespread variety of terms and conditions that it can end up being what leads the choice between one employer and another?

I ask because I've never seen any of this information available in other sectors before: the retail industry doesn't tell you these things until you apply, the public sector operates on fixed payscales, and even salaried jobs tend to have a range, or 'to be discussed' should you be successful, and even where Salary is stated, you rarely get to know the details of things like holiday if and until you reach interview. Do HGV firms (including both smaller firms and larger distribution companies) or train companies tell you this before you apply?

Whilst not wanting to get in to the ins and outs of the various jobs (which has been done many, many times before), are there any retail firms that still offer enhanced pay for weekend/bank holiday working (I'm pretty sure my former employer doesn't, just treating them as "normal days"), or overtime (ditto, just "you're getting more money because you're working more hours)? It just seems standard to me that you apply first and get told what the deal is as part of the process, rather than were you to just ring them up and ask about the conditions of employment.

You have a point, perhaps I am being a bit unrealistic. But a recent advert stating "up to 20k a year", with no reference to the hours required, makes that statement meaningless.

In the last non-driving job I applied for (NHS), I knew the length of the working week, the shift patterns, and the enhancements before I applied.

The Arriva adverts I am seeing mention the " free" uniform like they are doing you a favour, free travel, which is quite a benefit, it kills me paying on public transport.

They don't mention the overtime rate nor will they reply when you ask, but I have just had a text from a mate who still works there and it's flat rate. So that's why they won't tell you.

 

[dan5324]

The bus game has always been a bit of a pic and mix when it comes to pay and conditions. I remember years back I applied for a driving position. £13p/h was a decent rate at the time. Until I asked further questions. Yes you’ll get one weekend off every six weeks….we also operate on Xmas day and you can be Rota’d to work it. We don’t pay extra at weekends, no overtime rate, rotating shifts. One week of earlies one week of lates or even nights. We also choose when you take your holidays. Needless to say, I didn’t continue the application any further.

But yeah moral of the story is don’t just look at the hourly rate.

 

[lakeland844]

I have held a PCV licence for 27 years now- I have also held a Class 1 HGV for many years although I haven't very often used it until now.

I have worked for one of the major national companies for many years and have until recently been very content and satisfied in my job.
However within our company pay increases have consistently fallen behind resulting in the national minimum wage catching up rapidly year by year !
In perspective, I get one Saturday off during every four weeks and two Sundays.

The earliest start time is 05.30 and the latest finish is 02.38 - many of the duties have splits and layovers where you don't get paid.
No two days are the same and the start and finish times are all over the place - sound familiar ?

My reward for this was £10.78 per hour.

Last week I carried out an 11 and a half hour duty during which I carried 91 school kids on a double decker within the shift - a serious responsibility - just look a the poor guy in Winchester who, whilst driving a double decker, took on wrong turning and went under a low bridge whilst on a school duty !
Result - jail for 3 and a half years for a momentary lapse of concentration !

During the lockdowns, I stayed at my post throughout despite the risks as well as having to carry out cleaning ,disinfecting and fuelling the bus as the shunter/cleaner was furloughed - reward ?
A 1% pay offer for 2021 with no award for 2020. Strike date are already planned ......

In a few days time, I will be leaving the service of the company and the job I have loved and given my best for during the past few years and will start a new employment taking loads of crushed limestone ( which won't complain or give me a hard time ! ) in an articulated lorry from a local quarry to various local destinations - one load up - one tip - 6am start - 4.30pm finish Monday to Friday- be back home at 5pm every day -every weekend off and a very boring job - but a regular life pattern !
The rate of pay ?
I reckon I will be £250 a week better off - it's a no brainer but I will miss the bus drivers life a great deal and I so much wish it was different !

The senior managers don't seem to care or appreciate what is happening here - experienced staff jumping ship in large numbers ?
No doubt there are lots more 'modern apprentices' out there waiting to step into the breach - seriously ?
I wonder how many of them will still be in the industry in 27 years time?

Yes - the bus industry managers and directors need to wake up - smell the coffee and start valuing experienced drivers and pay them a decent rate before it's too late !

 

[Robertj21a]

All so very true.

All so very depressing.

So, realistically, how can bus operators pay much more in wages when many of them are struggling to survive financially?

 

[johncrossley]

I've just spent a day travelling around on Bus Éireann on middle distance routes out of Dublin and it seems a huge proportion of the drivers have foreign accents, so are probably mostly EU. So their wages may not be that good if 'born and bred' Irish men and women don't drive buses.