Deloitte to advise on liquidation or examinership of Dublin Bus

monument

Sunday Times editor tweeted this in a preview of tomorrow's paper:

ST [Sunday Times] Biz: Transport department hires Deloitte to advise on possible liquidation or examinership of Dublin Bus. (Plenty of room on top, folks)

The ultimate bluff?

coylemj

Wouldn't be the first time the Dept. of Transport threw money away on a pointless exercise. Mary O'Rourke when she was minister for Public Enterprise from 97 to 02 kicked many a can down the road by commissioning reports from consultants after which nothing happened though I believe when Micheal Martin was Minister for Health, he took this to a new level that has yet to be surpassed.

LXFlyer

I would not view this as in any way a pointless exercise.

Frankly it is making it clear to the employees in as blunt a manner possible that they need to get real. Otherwise the game is up.

Cookie_Monster

This is just going make the Unions even more uppity...

Grandeeod

lxflyer wrote: »

I would not view this as in any way a pointless exercise.

Frankly it is making it clear to the employees in as blunt a manner possible that they need to get real. Otherwise the game is up.

I would agree with this statement completely.

Grandeeod

Cookie_Monster wrote: »

This is just going make the Unions even more uppity...

Probably, but it has to come to a head at some point. IE should be next and I can already see it coming.

LXFlyer

I think we've gone well beyond the point where whether the unions are uppity or not matters.

The fact is that the leadership shown by the unions in this dispute has been pathetic. It should have been resolved after the strike in August, but it's been let linger on and on.

As I've said before, some clear thinking is needed now and hopefully this move will convince those that are in any doubt that this is the last chance saloon.

Grandeeod

lxflyer wrote: »

I think we've gone well beyond the point where whether the unions are uppity or not matters.

The fact is that the leadership shown by the unions in this dispute has been pathetic. It should have been resolved after the strike in August, but it's been let linger on and on.

As I've said before, some clear thinking is needed now and hopefully this move will convince those that are in any doubt that this is the last chance saloon.

I agree, but really feel that the last chance saloon scenario isn't hitting home and the traditional culture of state dependence isn't going away no matter what the department says.

LXFlyer

Grandeeod wrote: »

I agree, but really feel that the last chance saloon scenario isn't hitting home and the traditional culture of state dependence isn't going away no matter what the department says.

Well I don't think any of us can really make that sort of comment unless we work inside the company and until a further ballot is held.

However, one would hope that common sense will prevail.

Lets be honest, most Dublin Bus drivers are decent people, but they have not been given the sort of proper leadership from the unions that a situation this critical warrants.

That needs to change and fast.

end of the road

Grandeeod wrote: »

Probably, but it has to come to a head at some point. IE should be next and I can already see it coming.

i fear this happening more then dublin bus as i fear it could spell the end for much of the railway unless the government agree to pay private operators a fair subsidy to run it all and not just dart/commuter/dublin cork/dublin bellfast. liquidation of dublin bus would also be a disaster as i wouldn't be surprised if their was no plan ready to take up the slack if it did, getting a new operator ready along with the contracts would take a while, either way its worrying times ahead.

cgcsb

It's a worthwhile exercise even if nothing happens. If the strikers think they can be easily replaced by private sector workers, they'll soon back down

StreetLight

The way things are looking, those strikers may well soon become private sector workers themselves.

Hilly Bill

Who owns Dublin Bus?

thomasj

The Department of Transport has retained Deloitte, the accounting and consulting firm, to advise it on a possible liquidation of Dublin Bus.

MOD EDIT: PLEASE DO NOT QUOTE MORE THAN A PAR OR SO OF ANY ARTICLE

http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/news/ireland/article1329477.ece

(Subscription required to view full article - short bit readable)

cdebru

Just more scaremongering been there done that seen it all before.

thomasj

cdebru wrote: »

Just more scaremongering been there done that seen it all before.

I don't know.

I'm not sure what to make of varadkar, and he's my local TD.

There's something very thatcherite about him and time will tell if this was the ultimate bluff or genuine.

Either way, if Dublin bus was a private company, it would be long gone by now and i reckon its being looked at by fine Gael as a private company.......... In which case its not good.

Copyerselveson

thomasj wrote: »

I don't know.

I'm not sure what to make of varadkar, and he's my local TD.

There's something very thatcherite about him and time will tell if this was the ultimate bluff or genuine.

Well if DB or indeed any other part of CIE is insolvent I rather suspect he will push for examinership or even liquidation.

end of the road

cgcsb wrote: »

It's a worthwhile exercise even if nothing happens. If the strikers think they can be easily replaced by private sector workers, they'll soon back down

or maybe not, some could make sure the private sector replacements don't last by making things difficult, they can't be easily replaced by private sector workers as in the end ultimately it will cost the government more in subsidies, oh yes the NTA might regulate for a while but eventually like other bodies they will back down and bend over to the private operators who aren't going to (and rightly so) except the current subsidy level

end of the road

cdebru wrote: »

Just more scaremongering been there done that seen it all before.

i hope your right, all though if dublin bus was privateised no doubt their would be a lot more votes in it from the "i'm in the private sector and don't get this so nobody else can have it" brigade, ultimately i think it will be the possibility of being re-elected that will ultimately decide what happens, it is ireland after all

cdebru

lxflyer wrote: »

Well I don't think any of us can really make that sort of comment unless we work inside the company and until a further ballot is held.

However, one would hope that common sense will prevail.

Lets be honest, most Dublin Bus drivers are decent people, but they have not been given the sort of proper leadership from the unions that a situation this critical warrants.

That needs to change and fast.

The problem is that both unions took the view that they won't negotiate away terms and conditions so basically they just refused to negotiate then let the labour court guess what would be more acceptable.

The whole process is a nonsense the company come with a list of about 25 items that they say they need but none of these are ever costed, so no one knows which of the 25 the company actually want or need, it goes to the labour court and comes back with less than half of the original proposals so clearly the company were lying with the original proposals as half of them are gone but apparently they can still save the same money.

Why oh why the company can't treat its employees as adults, why can't they say this is how much we need, then this is how much each department ( traffic, maintenance, clerical, supervisory, management) need to contribute. These are the ways we can save money each individually costed. Then employees could see everyone is making a fair contribution they could also see what is actually needed , we would not have this ridiculous kite flying where the company adds in stuff so it can give the unions the "well look we stopped x, y and z.

It might be a novel approach but the current system is completely flawed, it harks back to the Bertie school of negotiation. The main problem is that how do the employees know when we have actually reached the bottom line? The scaremongering and last chance saloon nonsense is wheeled out and then there is another last chance saloon appears after a no vote, obviously there is a last chance saloon but is this one it or is there maybe another one ? The boy who cried wolf and all that.

murphaph

Ultimately state bodies should not be in the business of running buses and trains day to day. The state should simply regulate and tender out contracts with defined quality of service agreements. Failing to meet these agreed targets results in the contractor being financially penalised. The private contractors take nothing from the fare box: all that goes back to the NTA to help pay the contracted companies that way. There should be almost no cash fares being taken. Using anything other than a leap card should mean an expensive trip.

Yes, it probably will cost more but only because the TRUE cost of running public transport becomes known as the private operators won't tender for contracts where they stand to lose money. When the true cost is established it will finally become an election issue as politicians opt to either maintain subsidies from general taxation or reduce subsidies and only allow the NTA to put a more stripped sown offering out to tender. The public will then need to make themselves heard, especially the urban public who really don't make enough noise.

It's a painful process that we need to go through IMO.

end of the road

murphaph wrote: »

Ultimately state bodies should not be in the business of running buses and trains day to day. The state should simply regulate and tender out contracts with defined quality of service agreements. Failing to meet these agreed targets results in the contractor being financially penalised. The private contractors take nothing from the fare box: all that goes back to the NTA to help pay the contracted companies that way. There should be almost no cash fares being taken. Using anything other than a leap card should mean an expensive trip.

Yes, it probably will cost more but only because the TRUE cost of running public transport becomes known as the private operators won't tender for contracts where they stand to lose money. When the true cost is established it will finally become an election issue as politicians opt to either maintain subsidies from general taxation or reduce subsidies and only allow the NTA to put a more stripped sown offering out to tender. The public will then need to make themselves heard, especially the urban public who really don't make enough noise.

It's a painful process that we need to go through IMO.

why is it a process worth going through if at the end of it its ultimately going to cost us all more and we still end up with a monopoly? isn't it not fair to say that still in some countries the state still operates public transport but operates it well? isn't it ultimately probable that if dublin bus or all CIE companies end up privatised that other state operators will be a share holder in these companies? problem is, i really don't trust the NTA to do it in such a way that it will work out well for everyone

murphaph

end of the road wrote: »

why is it a process worth going through if at the end of it its ultimately going to cost us all more and we still end up with a monopoly? isn't it not fair to say that still in some countries the state still operates public transport but operates it well? isn't it ultimately probable that if dublin bus or all CIE companies end up privatised that other state operators will be a share holder in these companies? problem is, i really don't trust the NTA to do it in such a way that it will work out well for everyone

Some countries do have successful state run transport. Ireland is not one of those countries. CIE had decades as a fully integrated state run transport company to allow seamless integration of travel from one mode to the next and didn't bother. Dublin had zonal fares under the DUTC for heaven's sake: you could pay your penny and travel on multiple trams to your destination. Under CIE things actually went backwards!

There wouldn't be a monopoly by the way. All London buses are red but they are run by several companies who have to meet their targets or be penalised. TfL doesn't run buses themselves. They just set the targets and tender out the contracts and then police the service delivered. That's the way to run bus services.

My late father used to supply a main dealer and importer of bus engines. That company used to maintain the still under warranty units that were fitted in Dublin Bus vehicles at the time. The guys working on them worked on-site in Dublin bus garages but the Dublin Bus unions instructed the Dublin Bus mechanics never to work with those guys (and learn from their expertise in modern diesel bus engines) as they were non-unionised. That's the sort of mentality you're up against if you try to "reform" the likes of Dublin Bus. Their management aren't much use either to be honest.

The best way for Dublin is to go the TfL way.

end of the road

murphaph wrote: »

CIE had decades as a fully integrated state run transport company to allow seamless integration of travel from one mode to the next and didn't bother. Dublin had zonal fares under the DUTC for heaven's sake: you could pay your penny and travel on multiple trams to your destination. Under CIE things actually went backwards!

true, theirs a lot wrong with CIE, nobody said otherwise, however in an irish context privatisation won't solve all the things that are wrong for the simple reason ireland won't implament it properly, they will enforce the regulations for a while and then be pushed over by the private operators (don't tell me these operators won't have heard that ireland is a soft touch)

murphaph wrote: »

There wouldn't be a monopoly by the way. All London buses are red but they are run by several companies who have to meet their targets or be penalised. TfL doesn't run buses themselves. They just set the targets and tender out the contracts and then police the service delivered. That's the way to run bus services.

such a way isn't going to happen or even work in dublin, dublin is just to small, their aren't going to be multiple operators operating dublin bus routes should dublin bus be privatised or a tendering process come in, the system TFL has works because london is a huge city with probably hundreds of bus routes so their is room for a few operators, dublin only has a few routes in comparison and yet most of those are loss making.

murphaph wrote: »

My late father used to supply a main dealer and importer of bus engines. That company used to maintain the still under warranty units that were fitted in Dublin Bus vehicles at the time. The guys working on them worked on-site in Dublin bus garages but the Dublin Bus unions instructed the Dublin Bus mechanics never to work with those guys (and learn from their expertise in modern diesel bus engines) as they were non-unionised.

and that was wrong, but it isn't the fault of the union but the union leaders, ultimately its them who are responsible

murphaph wrote: »

The best way for Dublin is to go the TfL way.

but its not going to work, really all we can expect is one operator doing all the routes and thats it.

AlekSmart

murphaph wrote: »

.


My late father used to supply a main dealer and importer of bus engines. That company used to maintain the still under warranty units that were fitted in Dublin Bus vehicles at the time. The guys working on them worked on-site in Dublin bus garages but the Dublin Bus unions instructed the Dublin Bus mechanics never to work with those guys (and learn from their expertise in modern diesel bus engines) as they were non-unionised. That's the sort of mentality you're up against if you try to "reform" the likes of Dublin Bus. Their management aren't much use either to be honest.

Cahir House Garage ?

the groutch

end of the road wrote: »

why is it a process worth going through if at the end of it its ultimately going to cost us all more and we still end up with a monopoly?

not if it allows the tackling of the elephant in the room, the free travel passes. at most a few percent of the current passholders should be entitled to free travel, the rest should only be getting discounted travel.

Grandeeod

murphaph wrote: »

Some countries do have successful state run transport. Ireland is not one of those countries. CIE had decades as a fully integrated state run transport company to allow seamless integration of travel from one mode to the next and didn't bother. Dublin had zonal fares under the DUTC for heaven's sake: you could pay your penny and travel on multiple trams to your destination. Under CIE things actually went backwards!

There wouldn't be a monopoly by the way. All London buses are red but they are run by several companies who have to meet their targets or be penalised. TfL doesn't run buses themselves. They just set the targets and tender out the contracts and then police the service delivered. That's the way to run bus services.

My late father used to supply a main dealer and importer of bus engines. That company used to maintain the still under warranty units that were fitted in Dublin Bus vehicles at the time. The guys working on them worked on-site in Dublin bus garages but the Dublin Bus unions instructed the Dublin Bus mechanics never to work with those guys (and learn from their expertise in modern diesel bus engines) as they were non-unionised. That's the sort of mentality you're up against if you try to "reform" the likes of Dublin Bus. Their management aren't much use either to be honest.

The best way for Dublin is to go the TfL way.

I enjoyed that and quite right too. Outside the box, the box so many are afraid to be outside. Tradition is not good.

Victor

Hilly Bill wrote: »

Who owns Dublin Bus?

CIÉ, which in turn is owned by the minister.

Hilly Bill

Victor wrote: »

CIÉ, which in turn is owned by the minister.

I doubt it that Leo owns Dublin Bus Victor.

Dublin Bus wont go into liquidation unless the government had a new company ready to take over and all that will happen is a new name on the bus but the same drivers. They will be either on the same terms and conditions and possible better wages depending on the new company . What will most likely happen if it goes into examinership is that there will be forced cuts and job losses that the unions or the drivers wont be able to do anything about. I would say that Leo would love it to go into examinership just to say that he got one over the unions.

Victor

Hilly Bill wrote: »

I doubt it that Leo owns Dublin Bus Victor.

Leo doesn't, the minister (the officership) does.

Jawgap

thomasj wrote: »

I don't know.

I'm not sure what to make of varadkar, and he's my local TD.

There's something very thatcherite about him and time will tell if this was the ultimate bluff or genuine.

Either way, if Dublin bus was a private company, it would be long gone by now and i reckon its being looked at by fine Gael as a private company.......... In which case its not good.

Leo is all bark and no bite - he strikes me as someone who had read all the books, has all the words but take away his briefing notes and he'd be pretty useless.

If you want an idea of how this is going to play out then the personality to focus on is the Sec Gen in Transport, and the Asst Sec Gen responsible for Public Transport.

Hilly Bill wrote: »

I doubt it that Leo owns Dublin Bus Victor.

Dublin Bus wont go into liquidation unless the government had a new company ready to take over and all that will happen is a new name on the bus but the same drivers. They will be either on the same terms and conditions and possible better wages depending on the new company . What will most likely happen if it goes into examinership is that there will be forced cuts and job losses that the unions or the drivers wont be able to do anything about. I would say that Leo would love it to go into examinership just to say that he got one over the unions.

How do you know they haven't something lined up? With all the posturing going on, they'll have had plenty of time to line up their ducks - if they have, DB could be in trouble, but I suspect they've not (or if they have they've managed to avoid any leaks) which makes the appointment of Deloitte seem quite hollow as a threat.

murphaph

AlekSmart wrote: »

Cahir House Garage ?

Hi Alek. I'd rather not name the company on a public forum. I'll send you a PM.

murphaph

Proper reform including privatisation (TfL style, not a free for all) would also be good for the majority of staff who do perform their jobs well. The newly formed private operators would be a cold house however for dossers. Morale should improve as the minority who take the p!ss are weeded out. These private operators can also should louder at the various other agencies that are heavily responsible for providing a quality bus service, namely An Garda Siochana, the various local authorities, the NRA and of course the Dept. of Transport and its minister.

There are definitely too many Sir Humphreys hanging around blocking change. The CIE mandarins aren't about to raise their heads above the parapet and call a spade a spade. Private operators however will have an entirely different agenda.

cdebru

the groutch wrote: »

not if it allows the tackling of the elephant in the room, the free travel passes. at most a few percent of the current passholders should be entitled to free travel, the rest should only be getting discounted travel.

It won't address that problem at all, in fact I doubt it will even address any kind of government funding.
Under the model proposed by the NTA, they will be responsible for funding, they will collect the fares and the PSO and the money from the DSP for the free travel scheme. They will then pay the private operators an agreed amount per kilometre and there will be targets and penalties if those targets are not met. ( btw DB meets and exceeds all the NTAs targets).
The NTA will provide buses and depots, presumably they will also provide maintenance, and they will have to provide a central control and revenue protection.

So all the risk is really on the NTA (taxpayer and passengers) side, any possible advantages of the private sector as regards innovation , in bus types, fare structures, routes, etc etc are not going to happen as all that will remain under the control of the NTA ( a state agency which will suffer the same problems the CIE group currently has). The private operators will have zero interest in the fares, their level or their structure, they get paid no matter who travels or what they pay. Routes they are paid on a kilometre basis, they really won't care what route it takes whether it serves passengers or not remember they get paid either way.

The NTA will have the current headaches DB has, they are the ones that will have to balance the books, actually they will have more headaches than DB as they will not have as much access to potential cost savings as DB has.

When faced with the current situation the NTA will be the ones trying to pay their contracted operators from diminishing fares, as passenger numbers fall through the floor and with a government that is trying to cut costs and the PSO is just another cost.
Where will the money come from ? Well you just have to look at the history of the NTA, fare increases massive ones, there will be no pressure applied to government or to the free travel scheme at the end of the day the NTA are state employees just like CIE, they will just have to bend over and take it just like CIE, and the fare paying public will have to foot the bill.

So what will change very little really, just that some private companies will make money from public transport whether the country is in a crisis or in a boom they will make money either way, and the taxpayer and the paying travelling public will pay for it.

LoonyLovegood

Public transport isn't there for profit. It's always going to make a loss, but just try to minimise it. Varadkar isn't making any sense with this.

cdebru

murphaph wrote: »

Proper reform including privatisation (TfL style, not a free for all) would also be good for the majority of staff who do perform their jobs well. The newly formed private operators would be a cold house however for dossers. Morale should improve as the minority who take the p!ss are weeded out. These private operators can also should louder at the various other agencies that are heavily responsible for providing a quality bus service, namely An Garda Siochana, the various local authorities, the NRA and of course the Dept. of Transport and its minister.

There are definitely too many Sir Humphreys hanging around blocking change. The CIE mandarins aren't about to raise their heads above the parapet and call a spade a spade. Private operators however will have an entirely different agenda.

The problem with that is that, the real management are just going to be NTA mandarins not the private operators, and I haven't seen any evidence that they are more likely to raise their heads than the mandarins in CIE. The private operators are not really going to have a vested interest in change as they get paid irrespective.

The problems faced by the current CIE management, political interference and the Dept of Transport are still going to be there for the NTA.

LXFlyer

cdebru wrote: »

Just more scaremongering been there done that seen it all before.

I think that really is a naïve viewpoint in the extreme.

This company was bailed out last year - the government have made it clear that this will not happen again.

People really need to realise that the time for dragging their heels is over and that every staff member needs to do whatever is necessary for the company to survive.

cdebru

CTYIgirl wrote: »

Public transport isn't there for profit. It's always going to make a loss, but just try to minimise it. Varadkar isn't making any sense with this.

Well chances are that the first round of tenders will save money ( on paper at least) but the international experience is that any savings disappear quickly and it ends up costing more, this country has an abysmal record in regulation and I don't see any signs that will be different under the NTA.

n97 mini

lxflyer wrote: »

the government have made it clear that this will not happen again.

Do you really believe that though? Any move to make any big changes to the status quo and CIE is out on strike, probably followed in sympathy by Aer Lingus, half the public sector unions, the ESB etc.

cdebru

lxflyer wrote: »

I think that really is a naïve viewpoint in the extreme.

This company was bailed out last year - the government have made it clear that this will not happen again.

People really need to realise that the time for dragging their heels is over and that every staff member needs to do whatever is necessary for the company to survive.

Survive for what purpose ?

The government has already announced that the subvention is cut again for next year, this is the exact problem Noel Dowling pointed out, the fares go up the employees give cost savings and the government wipes it out with a subvention cut and we are back to square one again. It is a downwards spiral.

Where does it end ? will the company be in a position to undo some of the cuts in 19 months as promised? Or will as seems likely they be looking for further cuts to make up for the subvention cut next year and the year after ?

LXFlyer

cdebru wrote: »

Survive for what purpose ?

The government has already announced that the subvention is cut again for next year, this is the exact problem Noel Dowling pointed out, the fares go up the employees give cost savings and the government wipes it out with a subvention cut and we are back to square one again. It is a downwards spiral.

Where does it end ? will the company be in a position to undo some of the cuts in 19 months as promised? Or will as seems likely they be looking for further cuts to make up for the subvention cut next year and the year after ?

Where it ends is when the company finally becomes more efficient - there are still an awful lot of poorly designed rosters which do not maximise driver hours.

cdebru

lxflyer wrote: »

Where it ends is when the company finally becomes more efficient - there are still an awful lot of poorly designed rosters which do not maximise driver hours.

Like ?

LXFlyer

cdebru wrote: »

Like ?

I think that much is pretty obvious - why do we still have a situation where every duty on a Sunday morning has be 5 hours 40 minutes workout?

That imposes incredible restrictions on how the service can be designed.

dowlingm

Putting it out to tender wouldn't be the end of the story - if a private sector company won the contract there would doubtless be endless court appeals until the private company decided "feck it" leaving CIE as the only remaining tenderer. Mind you, that would never happen in big grown up countries.

StreetLight

lxflyer wrote: »

I think that much is pretty obvious - why do we still have a situation where every duty on a Sunday morning has be 5 hours 40 minutes workout?

That imposes incredible restrictions on how the service can be designed.

Quite easy for Monday-Friday office workers to pontificate on how others work on a Sunday.
SOME, not all, early Sunday duties are workouts. For those those who don't know, a workout is a duty which comprises approximately 5 hours and 40 minutes of straight working without a break.
The reason is that any early duty should be expected to finish reasonably around the 2pm or 3pm mark. If an early Sunday duty were to be changed to a Monday-Friday one, which may start at 5.30am or 6.30am to give the same finishing time, you would have a whole load of buses carrying fresh air on a Sunday morning, when frankly there is little demand.
You forget to mention the flip-side to an early Sunday duty is a late one which may start around 2pm or 2.30pm and not finish until well after midnight.

Losty Dublin

StreetLight wrote: »

Quite easy for Monday-Friday office workers to pontificate on how others work on a Sunday.
SOME, not all, early Sunday duties are workouts. For those those who don't know, a workout is a duty which comprises approximately 5 hours and 40 minutes of straight working without a break.
The reason is that any early duty should be expected to finish reasonably around the 2pm or 3pm mark. If an early Sunday duty were to be changed to a Monday-Friday one, which may start at 5.30am or 6.30am to give the same finishing time, you would have a whole load of buses carrying fresh air on a Sunday morning, when frankly there is little demand.
You forget to mention the flip-side to an early Sunday duty is a late one which may start around 2pm or 2.30pm and not finish until well after midnight.

Streetlight, for the benefit of us all but how exactly do Sunday rosters work in Dublin Bus?

LXFlyer

StreetLight wrote: »

Quite easy for Monday-Friday office workers to pontificate on how others work on a Sunday.
SOME, not all, early Sunday duties are workouts. For those those who don't know, a workout is a duty which comprises approximately 5 hours and 40 minutes of straight working without a break.
The reason is that any early duty should be expected to finish reasonably around the 2pm or 3pm mark. If an early Sunday duty were to be changed to a Monday-Friday one, which may start at 5.30am or 6.30am to give the same finishing time, you would have a whole load of buses carrying fresh air on a Sunday morning, when frankly there is little demand.
You forget to mention the flip-side to an early Sunday duty is a late one which may start around 2pm or 2.30pm and not finish until well after midnight.

Firstly, I would suggest that your use of the word "some" is rather generous, I would suggest, in this context. It is the vast majority of early duties on Sundays that have that constraint.

The fact that duties have that fixed time constraint means that it can become very difficult to use staff and buses efficiently - in certain cases (depending on the length of the route) there has to be empty running to/from the depot to get drivers back on time, while another driver goes empty to the outer terminus to start where the other bus had to finish.

I'm not in any way referring to having services on all routes at 05:30 - I'm merely pointing out that this sort of practice puts a serious constraint on operational efficiency within the company.

StreetLight

Losty Dublin wrote: »

Streetlight, for the benefit of us all but how exactly do Sunday rosters work in Dublin Bus?

It's swings and roundabouts like any other day, but because Sunday is a shorter working day for Dublin Bus, then some early duties are also shortened into 'workouts' as outlined above. However, this is not an exact science, as one duty rarely finished the same time as another.
So, to balance, some late Sunday duties start earlier to cover the shortfall caused by the finish of an earlier workout.
A driver will get, in theory, a fair crack of the whip within his/her roster. So, within a typical spare driver's five-week roster, s/he will get a late Sunday followed a couple of weeks later by an early Sunday.
It's all a balancing act to comply with the Company's requirements in tandem with the EU Working Time Directive. It should be noted that quite a lot of rosters have been changed over the last few years to meet these needs.

cdebru

lxflyer wrote: »

I think that much is pretty obvious - why do we still have a situation where every duty on a Sunday morning has be 5 hours 40 minutes workout?

That imposes incredible restrictions on how the service can be designed.

Why indeed? There is an answer though.

Because it suits the company. It is a breach of the EU driving work time directive. But it means that 5.40 then becomes the maximum time without a break rather then the 4.5 hours in the directive. This is used then for the other 6 days a week.
If you think the Sunday morning work out is restrictive to rostering imagine if they had to abide by the letter of the EU directive.

LoonyLovegood

cdebru wrote: »

Well chances are that the first round of tenders will save money ( on paper at least) but the international experience is that any savings disappear quickly and it ends up costing more, this country has an abysmal record in regulation and I don't see any signs that will be different under the NTA.

It probably will. I remember being told - whether this is true or not, I don't know - that DB had only six profitable routes for the last year information is available. They'll be the only ones sold off, and even then we'll end up with even worse service on them.

I want to have faith that it can be done well, but the difficulty is that this is Ireland, and any acts have to be overseen by the NTA. I don't trust them as far as I can throw them.

Losty Dublin

StreetLight wrote: »

It's swings and roundabouts like any other day, but because Sunday is a shorter working day for Dublin Bus, then some early duties are also shortened into 'workouts' as outlined above. However, this is not an exact science, as one duty rarely finished the same time as another.
So, to balance, some late Sunday duties start earlier to cover the shortfall caused by the finish of an earlier workout.
A driver will get, in theory, a fair crack of the whip within his/her roster. So, within a typical spare driver's five-week roster, s/he will get a late Sunday followed a couple of weeks later by an early Sunday.
It's all a balancing act to comply with the Company's requirements in tandem with the EU Working Time Directive. It should be noted that quite a lot of rosters have been changed over the last few years to meet these needs.

So effectively a Sunday "workout" is a Sunday shift where you have a later start than weekdays and a normal sign off time but you don't get a lunch/meal break, yes?