(16 Jul 2022, 6:04 pm)Ambassador wrote I honestly don’t think that second post in remotely offensive. They are stranding people and that’s mildly frustrated language  by someone who can’t get home.

In the context of the perception that responses are overly negative, then I think it's worth looking at how customer services staff are spoken to on a regular basis. 

I get the customer frustration, and I've been there myself, but there's better ways and means to challenge poor performance by a service provider.

(16 Jul 2022, 6:46 pm)mb134 wrote I appreciate at the moment it'll be worse than usual, but if we're honest if you're going into customer services you know it's going to be mainly negative experiences going in. 

If I've just bought a bottle of Fanta and I enjoy drinking it, I'll go on with my day as normal. If I buy a bottle of Fanta and it looks/smells/tastes funny or if I was overcharged and didn't realise, or if the bottle had already been opened/tampered with - I'm going to complain. It's extremely rare that people would contact customer services to say that a drink they like tastes nice - the same applies to bus services.

I expect my bus in the morning to turn up, and to turn up close to time. I can understand it being a bit late, and to be honest even if it didn't turn up one day having always turned up otherwise I'd probably give them the benefit of the doubt. The issue comes when it's constantly 10+ late, or if it doesn't rock up at all 2 days a week - and then I'd complain. But unless I get on and there's £1m waiting for me I'm not taking time out of my day to thank them for turning up, my thanks for that is the money I give them.

It shouldn't have to be mainly negative. Complaint handling is a small percentage of what customer service staff should generally be delivering. I'd say on the most part when I contact a variety of businesses, it's for information rather than to complain. But the situation some bus operators are in at present, I'd agree complaints are going to be the vast majority of contacts. 

I expect my bus to turn up too, but I wouldn't have a go at the next driver that turns up for the previous two not running. I don't see that doing so has any benefit, even if I am frustrated about the experience, because the driver has no influence over anything other than the bus they're driving. 

I'd still make a complaint when I got home or whatever, but I wouldn't speak to the staff like shit in doing so. The tone doesn't change the facts of the complaint, and again, the person handling the complaint hasn't got any influence over the faceless executives that are running the operation into the ground.