(05 Oct 2017, 3:56 pm)Dan wrote Or it leaves Darlington late due to it being a new driver on each departure, and they haven't got a driver to operate it (or s/he's come in late off their previous trip so are claiming their bait!) Darlington's alleged shortage of drivers certainly won't help matters, as any spare drivers will already be out on the road.
I recently attempted to travel on the final service of the day through to Peterlee from Darlington on a Saturday afternoon. The bus was dumped in Darlington near the Arriva canteen, blinded up for 'X21 Peterlee' and duty board in the window of the bus confirmed it was the one I was waiting for.
I waited for 15 minutes until the service's scheduled departure before deciding to press the bell down at the Arriva shop. After querying whether the service was going to operate (given that it was the last journey of the day operating to Peterlee), the bloke who opened the door didn't know and said he'd check to see if they could find a driver. About 5 minutes later, someone else came out and said that it would run. About 5 minutes after that, the driver eventually came (though didn't bother to check if anyone was waiting at the stand - assuming that everyone who was waiting had walked down to the shop where the bus was parked!)
Kudos to the driver - despite leaving 25 minutes late, he got into Peterlee around 10 minutes late so made up about 15 minutes. The journey was, er.. fun.. to say the least!
That's bad.
(06 Oct 2017, 8:57 am)Stuartphin1639 wrote It broke down on what would have been the 14:20 which was replaced by 1498
All Arriva depots seem to be going through the same problem with drivers
2850 is on Frequenta 2
Not surprised going by the experience I had trying to apply!
I wrote to them in May and was sent an application pack which I returned on 29th May. I had heard nothing by the end of July so on the 31st I rang the number quoted. This was at 220pm on a Monday. I got a recorded message saying the line was only open Mon-Fri 9-5! It gave me numbers for bus enquiries, rail enquiries and the PR office. I therefore emailed Arriva the same day and the following day they replied saying they had forwarded my email to the relevant department. I then received another email (headed “Good afternoon NATHAN” (not my name)!) saying that the department they had forwarded it to did not deal with job vacancies! They gave me a number to ring. I did so on 17th August, only to get a voicemail inviting applicants to leave their name and address for an application pack. I left a message explaining the position but I had heard nothing since. So on 4th September I sent a letter to the MD. I have had no response to that either!