Cowboy Operators a thing of the past?

[Jimmi]

Maybe less so these days considering the expenses of everything but there are still operators who will look at tendered work, undercut others, put low bids in and end up providing a sub standard service that gets them into hot water.

Especially those who take on any work that's going even if that means a huge increase of their operating load rather than taking it slow and steady. Some companies look professional at the start and then their standards soon slip.

Remember an operator local to me getting various contracts with a local authority and pretty much killed off half of these routes due to "low passenger numbers" which was likely a result of their poor operation more than anything, such as not running to registered routes & timetables, regular breakdowns including on a route operating around 35 miles from their base meaning you'd often have no chance of getting where u need to be with them when this happened, remember them effectively running two routes as one despite being registered as two separate routes, meaning the bus would end up doing one route whilst omitting a large chunk of the other besides the last few miles after finishing the other route (the route being omitted being a local authority contract service), for added fun, the time I did this journey hybrid journey, it was some Renault Master minibus being driven by a maniac.

Mercifully they've since disappeared, although did so with next to no notice on two contracts forcing the local authority to scramble to find operators, one having to run with no evening trips for about the first month with the new op and the other service was suspended for about a fortnight until someone could take over.

 

[JD2168]

Brightbus MASS were an interesting operation at least, had several ex Hong Kong double deckers in their fleet.

Very true. The ex Hong Kong’s were very interesting & manoeuvring them on narrow streets took some doing. This was before & showed that they were better at school buses than these early services

 

[nick291]

Very true. The ex Hong Kong’s were very interesting & manoeuvring them on narrow streets took some doing. This was before & showed that they were better at school buses than these early services

Yeah, now the likes of the Volvo B8L are sold here to shift large crowds.

 

[markymark2000]

As such, many councils struggle to get operators to undertake work as it is, and have little resource and so ability to manage the contractors that they can get. Which is why councils are reluctant to pull contracts for what may be regarded as relatively minor contraventions (e.g. a 28 seater mini when the tender says it must be 33). Only when you have wholesale non-performance, or significant safety breaches will they intervene.

Why bother wasting time, money and effort setting tender specs only for them to be ignored. Of course one off minor things like a misallocation they shouldn't pull a contract, but ongoing contract breaches, it makes a mockery of the whole tendering system. Doesn't matter how you perform in the end, as long as you talk the talk when putting in a bid, anything goes thereafter.

Similarly, the authorities will intervene if there are serious issues. That means that they won't be out with a ruler measuring the font size of legal lettering. Nor will they walk in and do spot checks on tachos or vehicles. And they never have - these are intelligence led. However, they will prioritise the serious or frequent issues. Therefore, if a driver truncates a service early on the last journey and no-one or one person raises a complaint, then it is unlikely to be pursued. If there is a major pattern of non performance, then they will investigate. This is no different to 20 years ago. Have a single vehicle fail an MOT is bad... have multiple vehicles fail will attract attention

What is the point in rules if no one will enforce them? I take your point on less enforcement staff, but that itself raises an issue. Even if issues are reported, no action seems to be being taken. In any case, it all helps the cowboy operators and a good number of them are thriving off it.

I did some calculations last year and one local authority in the West Midlands area was paying £1.1 million per year to operators who refused to comply with bus open data laws and regulations. £1.1 million. That is a huge sum of public money. All because no authority (local govt, DFT, Traffic Commissioner etc) is clamping down on non compliance with the law and no one is doing due diligence before issuing contracts.

 

[DJames]

Another still extant operator in the same area is Banga Buses. Both have had their run-ins with the authorities over the years shall we say!

In fact, Banga have recently been in front of the Traffic Commissioner. They're still operating, but with a warning, and a reduction in their licence.

 

[Tom Gallacher]

When the concession scheme in Scotland went digital quite a few operators decided to get out of the industry. I wonder why

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

Why bother wasting time, money and effort setting tender specs only for them to be ignored. Of course one off minor things like a misallocation they shouldn't pull a contract, but ongoing contract breaches, it makes a mockery of the whole tendering system. Doesn't matter how you perform in the end, as long as you talk the talk when putting in a bid, anything goes thereafter.

You are right.

It's a judgement of Solomon. A tender specifies a 33 seater but routinely gets a 28 seater. As long as people aren't being left behind, is that an issue? In that respect, a council may choose to ignore it rather than retender. If they are getting overloading complaints, then they doubtless will take action. They will take a nuanced view as to frequency and impact.

What is the point in rules if no one will enforce them? I take your point on less enforcement staff, but that itself raises an issue. Even if issues are reported, no action seems to be being taken. In any case, it all helps the cowboy operators and a good number of them are thriving off it.

I did some calculations last year and one local authority in the West Midlands area was paying £1.1 million per year to operators who refused to comply with bus open data laws and regulations. £1.1 million. That is a huge sum of public money. All because no authority (local govt, DFT, Traffic Commissioner etc) is clamping down on non compliance with the law and no one is doing due diligence before issuing contracts.

So for every law and regulation, in life, there should be 100% compliance. However, there isn't a speed camera or policeman on every road. Yet people generally adhere to the speed limits, and to the law in general. It's a rules based order and most people adhere to the rules. What they then do is prioritise those areas that are most serious - the accident blackspots, roads near schools etc.

If it's safety, the authorities will take action. I know - I've had to deal with a visit from the ministry (a moonlighting driver - nothing that we'd done wrong). PG9s and maintenance issues, tacho issues - that is what they prioritise. BOD stuff is lower priority and whilst they may get round to it, they have bigger fish to fry. And remember, that there are many more outfits in the freight industry that they have to worry about too.

 

[185]

have most of these operators fallen by the wayside?

....have most of these operators fallen by the side of your local station with an 'on hire to Arriva Rail Support' sticker in the windscreen?

Ah. That's where they've gone.

 

[lincman]

Brightbus MASS were an interesting operation at least, had several ex Hong Kong double deckers in their fleet.

Interesting is an choice description of MASS, everything they touched turned into a disaster, be it Applebys Lincoln depot, Reliance of Grantham or Leon of Finningley. They all went the same way rapidly downhill and confined then to history,

 

[Deerfold]

I'd say Hulleys were more the latter. If you're skint then non-essential maintenance does get put on the back burner and the consequence of that is that you get more breakdowns. More breakdowns means you can't run the service you're supposed to be running. And if you have fewer buses available then you try and work the remaining fleet much harder, so again service reliability goes out of the window.

Hulleys did register significant new commercial routes a couple of years before their demise that led to a council withdrawing tenders from other operators than didn't run them, only realising (or announcing) they couldn't at the last minute) and causing disruption to passengers who never saw one of their buses on their routes.

 

[nick291]

Interesting is an choice description of MASS, everything they touched turned into a disaster, be it Applebys Lincoln depot, Reliance of Grantham or Leon of Finningley. They all went the same way rapidly downhill and confined then to history,

I only really know what happened with their Sheffield operation, not their Lincolnshire operations but I did like the buses they had at least.

 

[Statto]

Hulleys did register significant new commercial routes a couple of years before their demise that led to a council withdrawing tenders from other operators than didn't run them, only realising (or announcing) they couldn't at the last minute) and causing disruption to passengers who never saw one of their buses on their routes.

Yeah, i remember Hulleys introducing a new express route X57 Sheffield-Manchester, which was a weird & brave decision, as it was during Covid, (although Lockdown had eased, people were still not traveling as they did pre Covid) they ended up extending it to Manchester Airport & interworked it with another route, but that didn't last long, issues with having enough staff to run the route, reliability, & not many people using the route, led Hulleys to withdraw the route.

 

[Pyewipecarshed]

I only really know what happened with their Sheffield operation, not their Lincolnshire operations but I did like the buses they had at least.

They bit off more than they could chew with the local service stuff, most of it was too far from HQ to be managed effectively.
MASS did alright after they gave up the stage carriage work and went back to concentrating on school contracts.

 

[61653 HTAFC]

In the early 2000s an operator trading as "EasiRider" started up in Huddersfield and tried to compete with First on a number of routes (301/302 Golcar and 328 to Balmoral Avenue spring to mind). It wasn't long before angry letters began appearing in the local paper, and the whole operation lasted maybe six months, tops.
Yorkshire Travel, the current operators of route 212 from Dewsbury to Wakefield via Batley & Kirkhamgate, are actually quite reliable... but their motley collection of vehicles are in all sorts of disparate liveries which doesn't give the best impression (no pun intended).

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

In the early 2000s an operator trading as "EasiRider" started up in Huddersfield and tried to compete with First on a number of routes (301/302 Golcar and 328 to Balmoral Avenue spring to mind). It wasn't long before angry letters began appearing in the local paper, and the whole operation lasted maybe six months, tops.
Yorkshire Travel, the current operators of route 212 from Dewsbury to Wakefield via Batley & Kirkhamgate, are actually quite reliable... but their motley collection of vehicles are in all sorts of disparate liveries which doesn't give the best impression (no pun intended).

Was that related to something like Paul’s Travel - I vaguely remember stumbling over their depot one day.

 

[61653 HTAFC]

Was that related to something like Paul’s Travel - I vaguely remember stumbling over their depot one day.

It may have been... Think both operated out of a unit on St John's Road just outside the ring-road, but I've no idea if they were linked.

 

[johntea]

In West Yorkshire we had M Travel who it eventually emerged weren't doing a very good job with their maintenance

Many of their routes were then acquired by Stanley Gath Travel but it turns out the daughter of the M Travel directors had basically just bought that company so they could continue to operate!

M Travel Ltd loses O-licence - CBW

M Travel Ltd of Glass Houghton, West Yorkshire, has had its O-licence revoked, the Wakefield Express reported. The company operated route 183 between Wakefield and Pontefract, the 134 between Pontefract and Castleford, services 487, 488 [...]

cbwmagazine.com

M Travel Ltd of Glass Houghton, West Yorkshire, has had its O-licence revoked, the Wakefield Express reported.

The company operated route 183 between Wakefield and Pontefract, the 134 between Pontefract and Castleford, services 487, 488 and 489 from Knottingley to Pontefract and back, services 30 and 39 between Pontefract, Upton and Hemsworth, number 49 between Pontefract and Low Ackworth, and several school services.

The operator had its licence officially cancelled from Saturday, April 29. Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) documents state that Directors Darren Mayes and Margaret Brown, who ran the company and its fleet of 26 vehicles, have also each been disqualified from applying for or holding an O-licence in the UK for 12 months.

The decisions followed a Public Inquiry (PI) into the company in Leeds, which took place in March.

At the PI, a number of maintenance issues were identified. S-marked prohibitions had been issued for tyres in bald or unserviceable condition, and defects recorded by drivers were not in turn handed over to the operator in a timely manner. Traffic Commissioner for the North East, Kevin Rooney, described the operator’s maintenance proceedings as nothing more than a paperwork exercise.

He said: “I have no hesitation in finding that this is an operator who is so bad as to need to be put out of business.”

Stanley Gath Travel licence revoked - routeone

In his decision the TC stated that the purchase of Stanley Gath Travel was merely a way to enter the industry while avoiding TC scrutiny The licence held by Stanley Gath Travel, which was acquired by the daughter of the directors of M Travel so that that business could continue, has been revoked...

www.route-one.net

In his decision the TC stated that the purchase of Stanley Gath Travel was merely a way to enter the industry while avoiding TC scrutiny

The licence held by Stanley Gath Travel, which was acquired by the daughter of the directors of M Travel so that that business could continue, has been revoked by Traffic Commissioner (TC) Kevin Rooney.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

It may have been... Think both operated out of a unit on St John's Road just outside the ring-road, but I've no idea if they were linked.

Think they ran to Golcar and yeah, sounds like the depot I found.

In West Yorkshire we had M Travel who it eventually emerged weren't doing a very good job with their maintenance

Many of their routes were then acquired by Stanley Gath Travel but it turns out the daughter of the M Travel directors had basically just bought that company so they could continue to operate!

M Travel Ltd loses O-licence - CBW

M Travel Ltd of Glass Houghton, West Yorkshire, has had its O-licence revoked, the Wakefield Express reported. The company operated route 183 between Wakefield and Pontefract, the 134 between Pontefract and Castleford, services 487, 488 [...]

cbwmagazine.com

Stanley Gath Travel licence revoked - routeone

In his decision the TC stated that the purchase of Stanley Gath Travel was merely a way to enter the industry while avoiding TC scrutiny The licence held by Stanley Gath Travel, which was acquired by the daughter of the directors of M Travel so that that business could continue, has been revoked...

www.route-one.net

They ran a load of ex West Mids Metrobuses?



In the North East, we had North East Bus Services of Gateshead and the wonderfully ironic Serene Travel in Northumberland. Sketchy!!

For real cowboys, Snaith’s of Otterburn were convicted (as were many drivers) of industrial scale tacho falsification.

 

[Whisky Papa]

As I've written on previous occasions, I drove for UK North for 18 months from late 2003, on day shifts only. I was not a fan of deregulation, it was a 'distress job' I needed to steady my mental ship, and keep a roof over our heads while my son did his A-levels,

While their business model was clearly predatory, over that period I did not find the operational side as chaotic as various other posters have described upthread. This was just before the GM Buses expansion onto the 192 got going, and the influx of foreign drivers had not yet started.

The vehicles were generally good to drive, particularly the Cummins/ZF Olympians, which were mechanically similar to what I'd been used to with First Calderline. The only buses which were obviously tatty were the handful of step-entance DAF single-deckers. Pre-service vehicle checks were supervised rigorously, and I can only think of only a couple of occasions when I had an issue requiring a change of vehicle during the day. Wages were paid correctly, and the odd on-the-road incident handled professionally - I had one minor collision in that time (admittedly with a police van!), and a significant amount of cash stolen out of the tray on another. I absolutely avoided contact with the owners, but got on well with the manager and other supervisors.

Certainly most of the drivers were exiles from other companies, but I don't recall anybody whose driving caused me concern. Personally, the big issue for me was their practice of dropping the buses out of service for their break in central Manchester, leaving around 8-12 buses searching for somewhere to park legally for 30 minutes, ideally with the possibility of finding a public toilet. Oh, and the state of the toilets in the garage - probably a complaint about those to Manchester's public health office would have got them shut down on the spot!

 

[DunsBus]

Think they ran to Golcar and yeah, sounds like the depot I found.

They ran a load of ex West Mids Metrobuses?



In the North East, we had North East Bus Services of Gateshead and the wonderfully ironic Serene Travel in Northumberland. Sketchy!!

For real cowboys, Snaith’s of Otterburn were convicted (as were many drivers) of industrial scale tacho falsification.

In the late eighties you had Tyne & Wear Omnibus Company stopping its Sunderland services for around 90 minutes in the middle of the day so that the drivers, who were all based in Gateshead, could have their mandatory lunch breaks.

 

[Pyewipecarshed]

Was that related to something like Paul’s Travel - I vaguely remember stumbling over their depot one day.

Easi Rider, Paul's Travel, Fair Rider and Sunny Travel were all related companies operating out of the same depot on St Johns Road. In most cases they operated at different times, although Paul's Travel ran alongside some of the others. The vehicles generally remained in the same livery and just had new fleetnames stuck on.
I don't know the full ins and outs but the directors of them were related; the only name I recall is Gurpal Singh as Easi Rider's legal lettering was "Gurpal Singh t/a Easi Rider".
I believe there was also a family link to Streamline who operated a service (to Lindley IIRC) for a few years until circa 2023/4 and who AFAIK are still in business as minibus hire and taxi operators from the same St Johns Road depot.

(Please note I am not suggesting that any or all of these operators/people were/are "cowboys" just answering a question up thread!)

They ran a load of ex West Mids Metrobuses?

Yes, later replaced with an eclectic mix of ALX400s, Irisbus Agora Lines and a few Optare Spectras.

 

[TheGrandWazoo]

In the late eighties you had Tyne & Wear Omnibus Company stopping its Sunderland services for around 90 minutes in the middle of the day so that the drivers, who were all based in Gateshead, could have their mandatory lunch breaks.

They were part of TMS and not a cowboy firm

 

[Lynford1976]

When British Bus purchased first Kentish Bus and then Maidstone & District, the investment in new buses was colossal. More than 70 new Dennis Dart SLFs, 25 Merc minis and about 18 Olympians all arrived with P registrations.

That's as may be, but it masked what was going on behind the scenes...

 

[greenline712]

Personally, the big issue for me was their practice of dropping the buses out of service for their break in central Manchester, leaving around 8-12 buses searching for somewhere to park legally for 30 minut

CMT buses in Liverpool (to be taken over by Glenvale) did much the same thing . . . they ran 4-5 routes with 6-8 buses on each, all competing with other operators. Their schedules worked each bus from around 0730 to around 1900 on weekdays, dropping out around 1100 and again around 1400 for a one hour break each time . . . in that way the drivers didn't exceed 10 hours driving each day. Quite where they parked up I don't know.
I'm not sure that they were a "cowboy" operation as such . . . they ran a decent fleet of buses which looked good enough from the roadside. Their timetables were strange, but as they only competed with other Liverpool routes, the gaps didn't seem to matter.

Now Glenvale, on the other hand . . . I was part of the Metroline team that spent a week in Liverpool looking at a potential purchase of them. They certainly had good routes, but after I'd seen the same Titan being towed in for three days in succession . . . our recommendation was to leave well alone!! Stagecoach took them on in the end, and I believe that it was a tough few years to turn them around!!

 

[mayneway]

UK North (Manchester) was a familiar one also Dennis coaches

UK North is questionable but what were the issues with Dennis’s?

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 27 Jun 2025 ==

UK North of course was shut down when one of their drug/alcohol* addled drivers knocked a cherry picker over and killed its occupant in a very clear case of dangerous driving.

* Not sure which it was, but my experience of their operation as a student was that both of those were common, possibly both at once, and dangerous driving and utter disregard for the timetable was the norm.

Not quite correct. The polish driver did hit the cherry picker where the operator wasn’t wearing a safety harness or safety gear.
It was found that the driver had been given a hand drawn note of the route he was driving and had worked over his legal hours for the day. He wasn’t under the influence of drink or drugs!

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 27 Jun 2025 ==

As I've written on previous occasions, I drove for UK North for 18 months from late 2003, on day shifts only. I was not a fan of deregulation, it was a 'distress job' I needed to steady my mental ship, and keep a roof over our heads while my son did his A-levels,

While their business model was clearly predatory, over that period I did not find the operational side as chaotic as various other posters have described upthread. This was just before the GM Buses expansion onto the 192 got going, and the influx of foreign drivers had not yet started.

The vehicles were generally good to drive, particularly the Cummins/ZF Olympians, which were mechanically similar to what I'd been used to with First Calderline. The only buses which were obviously tatty were the handful of step-entance DAF single-deckers. Pre-service vehicle checks were supervised rigorously, and I can only think of only a couple of occasions when I had an issue requiring a change of vehicle during the day. Wages were paid correctly, and the odd on-the-road incident handled professionally - I had one minor collision in that time (admittedly with a police van!), and a significant amount of cash stolen out of the tray on another. I absolutely avoided contact with the owners, but got on well with the manager and other supervisors.

Certainly most of the drivers were exiles from other companies, but I don't recall anybody whose driving caused me concern. Personally, the big issue for me was their practice of dropping the buses out of service for their break in central Manchester, leaving around 8-12 buses searching for somewhere to park legally for 30 minutes, ideally with the possibility of finding a public toilet. Oh, and the state of the toilets in the garage - probably a complaint about those to Manchester's public health office would have got them shut down on the spot!

I’ve worked with many drivers who one time or another worked for UK North and like you can only speak about it being professional and well run.
They got hit hard because they employed a lot of polish and Eastern European drivers - but the day they closed, representatives turned up at the yard from First and Stagecoach offering the so called inferior drivers immediate starts with them so they can’t have been that bad.

I actually got talking to the former owner of UNK who at the time ran a building firm in Glossop. He had some interesting things to say including the fact they were planning to reduce frequencies on all the existing routes and had registered to run on more routes such as the 216 and 219, strangely days after these registrations were put in they were closed down, with stagecoach having a vested interest - turning up at various court and PI’s.
The owner also pointed out to me at the time that the UK North licence was revoked because of maintenance issues yet the GMB licence wasn’t - but all the vehicles were maintained at the same depot by the same engineers and it was a daily occurrence that disks would be swapped etc.

UKN and GMB operated a huge number of GMPTE contracts and could in theory have continued to operate them but GMPTE suddenly pulled all its contracts and illegally withheld a huge amount of money owed to the company’s for operating tenders and pass reimbursements. This is why the company had to suddenly close. Ironically while the owners were in prison, a legal challenge was made by the owners solicitors and GMPTE were forced to pay what was owed making them millionaires whilst in prison.
The owner strongly believes the PTE revoking contacts and withholding payments was down to the insistence of Stagecoach who would have gone to great lengths to protect their routes.

 

[northern506]

PCL Travel in Northumberland are an operator who I'd describe as a cowboy operator. They are now shut down (I think), but operated a range of services in Northumberland.

They were well known for not showing up, no ticket machines, and bad drivers. Some of their services were regularly operated by vans with no destination blinds, or indication they were operating a public bus services.

They did win a bigger contract (470/473 in Alnwick), which used Optare Versas. I think they were stripped of this contract very quickly.

There's an article here in relation to them: https://www.route-one.net/legal/licence_cut_and_ban_as_tm_for_stocksfield_operator_raymond_johnson/

 

[mayneway]

Really interesting thread with some interesting comments.
As a driver in Manchester who’s worked for several operators I’ve got to be honest and say things often look very different to how enthusiasts see things.

JPT were probably up there at the top. Never worked for them but heard some horror stories. I do remember seeing a primo on the 217 one night making a very loud scraping noise with sparks coming from the rear of the bus, turns out the driver had flown over a speed hump and the exhaust had come loose and was dragging on the floor - driver told to carry on as it was tendered.

GHA were another one. Remember buses often running in and out of town with bin bags or carrier bags over the ticket machines.

 

[JD2168]

A current contender in South Yorkshire are Cawthorne’s Travel of Rotherham who run a mostly collection of vehicles mainly in previous operator livery (newest ALX400 they have is still in Stagecoach local) or at a short time a VDL Gemini they have ran round with Arriva logos on it until they were covered up with black tape. The other livery they have is to partially paint over the previous livery.

The blind is usually a piece of paper in the windscreen & they only accept Cash not cards as the notices in the window say.

 

[DunsBus]

They were part of TMS and not a cowboy firm

Indeed, but I recall that Busways didn't rate them very highly.

 

[Bungle965]

I do remember seeing a primo on the 217 one night making a very loud scraping noise with sparks coming from the rear of the bus, turns out the driver had flown over a speed hump and the exhaust had come loose and was dragging on the floor - driver told to carry on as it was tendered.

Those Primo’s certainly weren’t the best, I think they were falling apart from the moment that they left the factory

From my own experiences, M Travel and Stotts (based in Manchester, not Yorkshire) weren’t the best in Manchester. I recall that M Travel won a school bus tender in Manchester but routinely put buses without the capacity stipulated in the contract on the route.

Stotts was particularly challenging. The short-lived service from Rochdale to North Manchester General Hospital was run with a bus that never seemed to have a working ticket machine, so no fares were collected. The drivers varied; some were fine, others horrendous. I recall a driver coming out with the most racist things I’ve ever heard on one of their services once!

They were also one of the last in Manchester to not accept card payments before they ceased operations.