Dublin Bus looking for Drivers

Vic_08

GT89 wrote: »

Yes and once this crisis is over it will be much more difficult to put the resources back in place making public transport less attractive and people will return to their cars for good.

And you assume everyone has access to a car.

Once this is over a lot of people will be dead and even more will be without jobs, the aftermath of this is going to make 2008 seem like a Disneyland fantasy ride.

Carrying on like this is just a little blip that will pass quickly is reckless and stupid.

Public transport is a massive transmission risk, non-ESSENTIAL travel needs to stop right now and everyone who does need to move about will have to use personal transport or be provided infection free options.

GT89

Vic_08 wrote: »

Once this is over a lot of people will be dead and even more will be without jobs, the aftermath of this is going to make 2008 seem like a Disneyland fantasy ride.

Carrying on like this is just a little blip that will pass quickly is reckless and stupid.

Public transport is a massive transmission risk, non-ESSENTIAL travel needs to stop right now and everyone who does need to move about will have to use personal transport or be provided infection free options.

Certainly there will need to be reductions to peak time services especially Xpressos and Euros due to the reduction in demand. At the end of the day public transport is needed both at peak and off peak times. The only way you can keep people using public transport is through frequency. Once you cut frequency you are asking for a decline in use and a shift back to private cars.

Personally I would regard public transport as an essiential service just like supermarkets, refuse collection and vital maintence services. Personally I would regard the queues in supermarkets as a far greater transmission risk than partially buses and trains. Once people apply social distancing. No form of transport is going to be transmission free.

punisher5112

I wonder will the 600 hybrids still be coming?

AlekSmart

punisher5112 wrote: »

I wonder will the 600 hybrids still be coming?

I'd suggest yes.

It's a five year proposal,with the initial 100 units being the only firm contract so far.

https://www.independent.ie/business/irish/alexander-dennis-wins-600-bus-order-for-national-transport-authority-at-a-cost-of-around-450000-per-vehicle-38910889.html

The NTA said the first 100 buses were being provided at a cost of approximately £38m (€45m). If all 600 buses were ultimately delivered, this would cost £230m (€270m). The buses will be provided both to Dublin Bus and Bus Éireann.

However,it is also sadly clear that ALL infrastructural budgets willl now come under pressure into the future.

The eventual cost to the exchequer of the current measures will be horrific,and this is across the World,not just here.

If it were up to me,I would immediately cease the age-based fleet withdrawal programme and equally quickly restart the refurbishment of older vehicles,as in AV/AX/EV/VT and whatever else is currently awaiting the auctioneers gavel.

It is also highly likely that projects such as Busconnects,will be threatened,even if only by lengthening their time frame yet again.

Not quite all DOOM,but a period of GLOOM for sure is ahead.

punisher5112

If anything is to come of this I can see less people travelling to work in offices as many will be working from home and businesses will see that they will save money as they will cut down on office space.

This will in turn put less onto buses and of course with many unfortunately losing their jobs this will take a hit....

The AV are near all gone, even good few Ax are gone....

GT89

punisher5112 wrote: »

If anything is to come of this I can see less people travelling to work in offices as many will be working from home and businesses will see that they will save money as they will cut down on office space.

This will in turn put less onto buses and of course with many unfortunately losing their jobs this will take a hit....

The AV are near all gone, even good few Ax are gone....

Less people on buses at peak times could be a good thing in the long run as long as frequency is maintained. It won't suddenly go back to normal overnight businesses will reopen but may have to start staggering start and finish times. Over time we may see more staggering of working times becoming the norm.

Which may put an end to the morning and evening rush hours. Less traffic on the road and less people on public transport will mean buses will maintain frequency throughout the day and hopefully less bunching, less overcrowding and quicker journey times. Of course there would be less of a need for Euros and Universals.

GT89

Go-Ahead still seem to be training drivers saw one of their training buses pass my house earlier

john boye

I've seen DB training out most days too recently.

punisher5112

GA can't keep drivers, I'd say db may be just putting the last few through, I honestly see this hitting big and huge losses..,

Better Than Christ

GT89 wrote: »

Go-Ahead still seem to be training drivers saw one of their training buses pass my house earlier

They're currently assessing existing drivers, not training new ones. They seem to have enough drivers. For now...

GT89

Better Than Christ wrote: »

They're currently assessing existing drivers, not training new ones. They seem to have enough drivers. For now...

What's the purpose of assessing drivers? Surely a drivers accident record is enough of an assessment.

Better Than Christ

GT89 wrote: »

What's the purpose of assessing drivers? Surely a drivers accident record is enough of an assessment.

Identifying and ironing out bad habits. The fact that someone hasn't (yet) had an accident doesn't mean they're a good driver.

Also, they currently have a surplus of drivers, and the ADIs have little else to do, so it's a good time to do it.

john boye

GT89 wrote: »

What's the purpose of assessing drivers? Surely a drivers accident record is enough of an assessment.

Drivers would presumably have to take regular refresher courses. A bit naive to just go off his/her accident record.

AlekSmart

GT89 wrote: »

What's the purpose of assessing drivers? Surely a drivers accident record is enough of an assessment.

Most large operators would have a programme of ongoing training for ALL staff.

Now usually defined as Continuous Personal Development (CPD) it is usually a role focused refresher day,so,whilst accident/incident records would form a part of such assessments,they would not be the ONLY focus of such training.

Orlando2019

Hi Guys !

I have a question for who ever might know about this:

At the beginning of this year I went through the recruitment process for Dublin Bus Driver making it all the way to the reference checks in early march, after that I was informed that the recruitment process has been indefinitely frozen.

I quickly learned to live with the Idea that I might not be recruited any time soon probably not this year.

My main question is If a long time passes will my application be closed and I would have to go through again ?
Does any one know anything about how that works or has had a similar experience?

Thanks in advance

AlekSmart

Orlando2019 wrote: »

Hi Guys !

I have a question for who ever might know about this:

At the beginning of this year I went through the recruitment process for Dublin Bus Driver making it all the way to the reference checks in early march, after that I was informed that the recruitment process has been indefinitely frozen.

I quickly learned to live with the Idea that I might not be recruited any time soon probably not this year.

My main question is If a long time passes will my application be closed and I would have to go through again ?
Does any one know anything about how that works or has had a similar experience?

Thanks in advance

Impossible to be definitive on it,but,going on previous (less significant) recruitment freezes,applicants who had already progressed into the process were contacted regarding restarting.

However,this is obviously dependent on every aspect remaining unchanged.

Best advice I can think of is to contact company HR and enquire ?

Best of luck either way !

Orlando2019

Got the call this morning, starting in 2 weeks, realy unexpectedly I almost last my hope it would happen this year.

There still is hope, thanks everyone for all the information shared!

patrickc

Orlando2019 wrote: »

Got the call this morning, starting in 2 weeks, realy unexpectedly I almost last my hope it would happen this year.

There still is hope, thanks everyone for all the information shared!

Best of luck

LastStop

Orlando2019 wrote: »

Got the call this morning, starting in 2 weeks, realy unexpectedly I almost last my hope it would happen this year.

There still is hope, thanks everyone for all the information shared!

Good stuff, I'm sure you'll enjoy it.

krusty 123

Hi everyone, there is someone here who had a written assessment on 20/02/2020?

rx8

Orlando2019 wrote: »

Got the call this morning, starting in 2 weeks, realy unexpectedly I almost last my hope it would happen this year.

There still is hope, thanks everyone for all the information shared!

Would love to hear an update on this... How did you find the whole training experience and set-up. What garage you were sent to, (assuming you made it through), how you and your fellow trainees are finding your feet, mentoring experiences etc.
Best of Luck anyway.

Orlando2019

rx8 wrote: »

Would love to hear an update on this... How did you find the whole training experience and set-up. What garage you were sent to, (assuming you made it through), how you and your fellow trainees are finding your feet, mentoring experiences etc.
Best of Luck anyway.

Luckily I did made it through the whole process and I'm now a fully pledged driver, I would not give out the name of the garage I was assigned to so not to make myself too identifiable, but here's how it all went down in my own experience:

I started the training in early june, my group was among the first few groups to start training after the centre was closed due to Covid19.

The first 3 weeks of training focused solely on you getting the D licence test nothing else, and I can say that getting the test was the single worrying stress I had in my entire training experience, nothing was certain until you had passed the test, we all knew that if you fail it twice you are let go.

After I passed my test first time lucky, everything was smooth sailing from there onwards, I started the customer service, all the the bits and pieces regarding the bus driver job how to use the ticket machine and all that, done all the type training driving all the different busses of the fleet.

I can't praise enough how good and and really sound the trainers are they all have so much to teach you and We got passed around to different one throughout the course which was a good thing because there was something to learn from each one of them and a different perspective and all.

After the training was concluded whe started at the garage with the mentor for a week, we learned 2 busy routes and started taking passengers for the first time, which was a different game all together.

It's been a month now since I've been out on my own, I still very much love it, it doesn't feel like work really to me It's a pleasure to drive the bus, every journey is different there is always something happening on the bus, you never know who will walk in next, silly mistakes are made every now and then which do help you gain experience and make you into a better driver.

My overall all experience is that it was a great training process plenty of craic to it, the job itself its fun, can be difficult at times , mentally exhausting but really enjoyable.

The people at Dublin bus from trainers to managers to inspectors are A1 people really sound and helpful, I have met some really nice other drivers, and some rude drivers who you just simply have to ignore at times, always do what is right to do don't listen to anyone else.

This was my experience with my Dublin bus career so far, of course there is so much more to add that I could write a book about it.

Thanks again All the best !

GT89

Orlando2019 wrote: »

Luckily I did made it through the whole process and I'm now a fully pledged driver, I would not give out the name of the garage I was assigned to so not to make myself too identifiable, but here's how it all went down in my own experience:

I started the training in early june, my group was among the first few groups to start training after the centre was closed due to Covid19.

The first 3 weeks of training focused solely on you getting the D licence test nothing else, and I can say that getting the test was the single worrying stress I had in my entire training experience, nothing was certain until you had passed the test, we all knew that if you fail it twice you are let go.

After I passed my test first time lucky, everything was smooth sailing from there onwards, I started the customer service, all the the bits and pieces regarding the bus driver job how to use the ticket machine and all that, done all the type training driving all the different busses of the fleet.

I can't praise enough how good and and really sound the trainers are they all have so much to teach you and We got passed around to different one throughout the course which was a good thing because there was something to learn from each one of them and a different perspective and all.

After the training was concluded whe started at the garage with the mentor for a week, we learned 2 busy routes and started taking passengers for the first time, which was a different game all together.

It's been a month now since I've been out on my own, I still very much love it, it doesn't feel like work really to me It's a pleasure to drive the bus, every journey is different there is always something happening on the bus, you never know who will walk in next, silly mistakes are made every now and then which do help you gain experience and make you into a better driver.

My overall all experience is that it was a great training process plenty of craic to it, the job itself its fun, can be difficult at times , mentally exhausting but really enjoyable.

The people at Dublin bus from trainers to managers to inspectors are A1 people really sound and helpful, I have met some really nice other drivers, and some rude drivers who you just simply have to ignore at times, always do what is right to do don't listen to anyone else.

This was my experience with my Dublin bus career so far, of course there is so much more to add that I could write a book about it.

Thanks again All the best !

Excellent account. 3 weeks sounds tough to go to learn to drive a bus.

Orlando2019

GT89 wrote: »

Excellent account. 3 weeks sounds tough to go to learn to drive a bus.

Thanks it can be stressful because , you are leaving everything behind to go out and become a bus driver and you are not 100% you have the job until you get that D test, we were 6 groups at one stage, and out of all of them at least one person failed their test in each group apart from one where all 4 of them passed, and one individual person failed it twice and was let go, which did not help with the morale.

But apart from that, it was a fun 6 week period no pressure was ever placed on you,

Getting to learn to drive a bus and get paid at the same time .

Lockoo

I'm at the medical stage only to be told iv to lose a certain amount of weight .I dont mind this it just puts back my starting date. I disappointed that I no stage of the job application did somebody weight come into it. I understand why but I could of worked on my weight instead of waiting to get to medical stage an to be told by a nurse an not even Dublin Bus HR. So if to out myself under pressure to lose the weight an I hav9ecens started to learn how to drive the bus, I'm on learner license. Alot of stress so hope it worth it.

dashcamdanny

Lockoo wrote: »

I'm at the medical stage only to be told iv to lose a certain amount of weight .I dont mind this it just puts back my starting date. I disappointed that I no stage of the job application did somebody weight come into it. I understand why but I could of worked on my weight instead of waiting to get to medical stage an to be told by a nurse an not even Dublin Bus HR. So if to out myself under pressure to lose the weight an I hav9ecens started to learn how to drive the bus, I'm on learner license. Alot of stress so hope it worth it.

There is quite alot about your BMI on this thread and how it has knocked back a few folk.

If I where you, I would just work on getting the weight down asap. the problem with getting your own licence is that you need to back it up with experience.

If you pass the test on your own, Dublin bus will valuate your driving skills as an experienced driver. This is fine if you pass the test the same week as your interview with Dublin Bus.
But in reality you may be tested by DB in a bus and it may have been weeks or even months since you last sat in the driver seat. I know of a few people this happened to and they failed, one even crashed.
Once in the door, you will have more than enough time to practice with one on one training and be paid for it.

My advise is to work on your BMI and study the theory end of the practical CPC and test questions. Let DB take care of the rest.

Lockoo

dashcamdanny wrote: »

There is quite alot about your BMI on this thread and how it has knocked back a few folk.

If I where you, I would just work on getting the weight down asap. the problem with getting your own licence is that you need to back it up with experience.

If you pass the test on your own, Dublin bus will valuate your driving skills as an experienced driver. This is fine if you pass the test the same week as your interview with Dublin Bus.
But in reality you may be tested by DB in a bus and it may have been weeks or even months since you last sat in the driver seat. I know of a few people this happened to and they failed, one even crashed.
Once in the door, you will have more than enough time to practice with one on one training and be paid for it.

My advise is to work on your BMI and study the theory end of the practical CPC and test questions. Let DB take care of the rest.

Thank you for that.

Iv done the theory an CPC. I have my provisional bus lice.

Is there more theory to study. Is it Dublin Bus that conducts the test it self?

dashcamdanny

Lockoo wrote: »

Thank you for that.

Iv done the theory an CPC. I have my provisional bus lice.

Is there more theory to study. Is it Dublin Bus that conducts the test it self?

Yes.
You will be tested as if its your D test.

And then undergo another 4 weeks training

Lockoo

dashcamdanny wrote: »

Yes.
You will be tested as if its your D test.

And then undergo another 4 weeks training

Thanks agian.

Just another question.

What the over time rate of pay, I'll be on nights an I think night shift an sunday is included in the basic salary.

Tell more if you no.

Midnight_EG

Lockoo wrote: »

Thanks agian.

Just another question.

What the over time rate of pay, I'll be on nights an I think night shift an sunday is included in the basic salary.

Tell more if you no.

There's not much overtime available to a 4 day night shift driver, but if you mean working rest days then you'll find out once you get in. Rates are different for 4 and 5 day drivers and dependent on hours too.