Where are the smaller buses? The Driver Problem
Hello, there has been some recent discussion regarding buses on the island or the lack thereof. Ask practically anyone on Guernsey and you will generally find agreement that the buses should be smaller. You might also hear that there needs to be more of them.
Smaller, more frequent, preferrably electric buses is often proffered like an obvious solution because, well, it is, isn’t it?
So why don’t we have More, Smaller Buses?™
The crux of the issue, we are told, is staffing. More buses needs more drivers, obviously. We are also told that they just cant seem to get the staff. This must be what people are talking about with that “no-one wants to work these days” line that I have heard for all the days I’ve had ears.
So why aren’t we able to get drivers? Are they all millenial softies, afraid of a hard days graft? Or is there something we’re missing. Let’s look at this from the perspective of a 2-year qualified PCV (Cat D) Holder in the UK. We’re going to assume that they are single or otherwise free to move around alone, with no dependents, etc.
The National Express Option
We’re going for the average so let’s pick the midlands for this example. Birmingham National Express is paying £16.23 an hour for people with 2 years PCV and if you stay there for a year that will increase to £18.23.
If you drive a conservative 40hr week you will pull in a base pay of around £35-38k per year. You can legally drive up to 10 hours in a day so if you can drive more you will get paid more. You will also receive:
- Free National Bus & Coach travel
- Free Coach travel for a nominated person or Free buses for your partner
- A Further 50% discount on coaches for all your friends and family
- A pension and life assurance cover
- Paid Annual Leave
- Free CPC training (required every 5 yr for public commercial drivers)
- Free license medicals
- Gift vouchers at key milestones or for good service
- A benefits and savings card for many retailers and service providers
- A mobile health check facility, and free counselling
- A tax free bicycle (with interest free payment plan) from the cycle to work scheme
- Discounts on mobile plans
The Guernsey Offering
In Guernsey you will get around £16.25 per hour also, and if you drive nights or Sundays you will get £19.50 per hour for those hours. This works out to around £35k a year for an average week. Like the UK you can work extra hours if available. The only difference is there is no legal limit on how many hours you can drive consecutively. There are, however, limits to how many working hours there are in a day because we only have night service on Fridays and Saturdays.
OK so the pay is arguably similar but different, let’s look at what benefits you get:
- Paid Annual Leave
- A Uniform (if you lose or damage all or part of the uniform you will be fined £50 by the government)
- A DBS check (you will have to pay for the subsequent update checks every year after)
- An option to house/flat share with other drivers for only £700-£800 a month
- An option to rent your own place (for an average of £1900 per month)
- No healthcare, not even national
- No Pension
- No Discounts
- No paid travel, you must pay your way here
- If you stay for 12 months you will have to convert your PCV to a Guernsey PSV
- No paid medicals
On top of all this you will only be paid £12.50/hr for the first few weeks while you learn the roads. I feel like I don’t really need to say any more. You would be a fool to drive buses in Guernsey if you can drive them in the UK.