(20 Mar 2022, 6:44 pm)Jimmi wrote Arriva Darlington is in an absolute state atm with many cancellations including on hourly services like the 8/8A, I'm at my wits end with them as I've struggled to cope with the service being provided as cancellations make it difficult to get anywhere and if by some miracle a bus does turn up its usually rammed due to said cancellations on previous trips and usually a Solo will turn up. Supposedly this is from issues with vehicle availability rather than drivers, not helped windows are being put out most nights atm forcing buses off the road for days, last Saturday supposedly the first service to Barnard Castle from Darlington wasn't until after 10:30 (excluding the 10:01 84 ran by Scarlet Band).
Yet not a peep out of Arriva - either on Social Media or the website.
GNE are getting a lot of criticism for cancellations and delays at the moment, and rightly so, but I do think that some of it is due to the level of transparency they're offering. Strictly speaking, there's nothing mandating them to publish cancellations or even notify the public of them, but they opt to do so. Some other operators, such as Transdev, are working along the same lines, but others aren't even giving their customers the decency of any information.
Looking at Darlington's 7 yesterday, and at a glance I can see the: 08.02, 10.42, 11.42, 13.22, 14.22 and 16.02 from Darlington didn't run, nor did the 09.24, 12.04, 13.04, 14.44, 15.44 and 17.24 from Durham. Not a single post to tell anyone that was the case.
Its a universal problem without any consistency. There needs to be a lot more done for customers faced with disruption, otherwise you'll never build confidence up with customers.