About Stagecoach Yorkshire and Chesterfield

Key facts: May 2015 – April 2016

• 44.5 million passenger journeys 
• 20.86 million miles operated 
• 1,230 employees 
• 420 buses 
• 99.3% reliability 
• 93.8% punctuality

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Our passengers

In total our customers made 44.5 million journeys on our buses over the year.

We encourage our customers to make comments and suggestions about our services. Over the last 12 months we have received 2716 complaints, equivalent to one complaint for every 16384 passenger journeys. We comply with the industry code of practice and every complaint is thoroughly investigated. Every suggestion or comment on possible improvements is considered and often changes to services, tickets, routes and timetables have been made to take into account feedback from our customers.

In April 2016, we used feedback from our customers in Chesterfield to create a new child dayrider for the area. The Chesterfield Child dayrider Plus offers unlimited travel all day for children on Stagecoach services in and around Chesterfield.

An independent customer satisfaction survey by Passenger Focus, published in March 2016, showed that our overall customer satisfaction rating was 88%.

Our staff 

We are a major employer in the local economy with 1230 staff, 980 of whom are drivers, based at 5 depots located in Barnsley, Rotherham, Chesterfield and two sites in Sheffield.

The majority of our staff also live within the local communities in which our buses operate.

All of our drivers have or are in the process of earning a Certificate of Professional Competence (CPC). They also receive other training, including customer care, cycle awareness and disability awareness.

Our engineers have skilled qualifications, and we are active in getting more young skilled people in our company each year through the award winning Stagecoach Apprenticeship programme.

Our supervisors and managers have all completed relevant training courses for their roles. Many of our staff have shown an impressive commitment and loyalty to Stagecoach. Each year we hold Long Service Awards and in 2015/16 23 of our staff achieved milestones of between 20 and 50 years’ service with us, representing a total of 630 years service.

We are proud of our employees for both their work performance and their individual achievements.

Barnsley depot driver Bob Pitts, who has worked for the company for over 37 years was awarded the Road Operators Safety Council (ROSCO) Safe Driver of the year at the UK Bus Awards.

Our Apprentice Engineers took top prize for First Year Apprentice of the year and Third Year Apprentice of the year at the Stagecoach UK Apprentice of the year awards.

In 2015, we held a Customer Service Stars competition where our customers voted for their favourite driver and staff members from each of our depots were recognised.

We also have an annual Bus Driver of the year competition where the three highest scoring members of our driving staff are put forward to take part in the national final held in Blackpool.

Our services

Our services covered over 20.8 million miles over the year.

Our key measures of performance include the reliability and punctuality of our services. We operated 99.3% of all our journeys.

All of our buses are now fitted with automatic vehicle location technology. In the past year 93.8% of our services started their journey within five minutes of their scheduled time and we achieved 87.5% mid-point punctuality. Traffic congestion and roadworks are the most common reason for delays.

We have dedicated staff based in the Urban Traffic Control offices in Sheffield who work closely with our local authority partners to ensure that buses are running on time and that any services that experience delays or disruption are dealt with swiftly and effectively so as to minimise any potential disruption to the service and our customers.

We continue to seek improvements both through rescheduling our services and in discussions with our local highway authority partners. In 2015/16 we made a large number of timetable changes to improve punctuality, which we know is very important to our customers. Our previous investment in the Stagecoach Gold X17 Sheffield – Chesterfield – Matlock route has resulted in continued growth, including a 5% increase in patronage year on year.

In 2016, we committed additional staff and buses at short notice to help maintain service when another local bus operator ceased trading. We worked alongside South Yorkshire Passenger Transport Executive to ensure that people were not left without a service.

We are part of the Sheffield and Rotherham Bus Partnerships, working together with other bus operators, the local authority and South Yorkshire Passenger Transport Executive to provide better buses and multi bus operator, value for money tickets for local communities. We also carried out much work in preparation for the Doncaster Bus Partnership which was launched in May 2016 after a period of public consultation. In addition to this, we are currently working towards the formation of the Barnsley Bus Partnership, which is due to launch early 2017.

Our fares

We offer value for money fares and ticket  options, including standard single fares and unlimited travel zone tickets. 

We also have a range of special tickets for students,  young people and jobseekers.

Our fleet

We operate a fleet of 420 buses, which include:

- 36 hybrid electric buses

- 14 buses with Euro 6 engines

In the last year we invested £1.9 million in 14 single-deck buses with Euro 6 engines which reduce carbon emissions dramatically and add to our fleet of efficient, modern buses. These were introduced on to our popular services 11 (Barnsley - Athersley North) and 22x (Barnsley - Wath - Rotherham). We also introduced 15 buses, which were under one year old, on to our Dearne Valley services, further improving the quality of our fleet. Our average fleet age is 7.1 years, ahead of the government target of 8 years.

Almost all of our vehicles are fitted with CCTV and over 100 now have free WiFi for the convenience of our customers.

Servicing our buses

All our vehicles are inspected by our engineers every 28 days, and maintained to high standards to ensure passenger safety and comfort. Every vehicle is cleaned at the end of each day. This process is supported by our in-service cleaning teams operating at Barnsley Interchange during the daytime.

Independent research by Passenger Focus revealed that 80% of our customers are pleased with the condition of the bus exteriors, and 80% per cent were satisfied with the tidiness of the bus interiors.

Our environment

We continue our aim to become a greener, smarter bus operator; not just on the road but in our depots, workshops, offices and canteens.

Stagecoach Group has achieved the Carbon Trust Standard for reducing energy consumption, and continues to have a challenging CO2 reduction programme.

Our hybrid electric buses and new buses with the latest Euro 6 engines are designed to maximise fuel efficiency. The rest of our fleet runs on B30 diesel which has only 70% carbon content. Our engines are fitted with controls which optimise fuel consumption. Every bus is fitted with technology that gives drivers instant feedback on their driving and allows us to better assess performance.

In November 2015, we worked with renewable energy company, Visolaris, to fit almost 100 250 kWp (kilowatt peak) solar panels to the roof of our Chesterfield depot. This project aims to reduce our carbon emissions and energy costs by generating a significant proportion of clean green renewable energy. In April 2016, the solar panels generated over 33% of the electricity used at our Chesterfield depot.

In April 2016, we recycled or redirected away from landfill 89% per cent of our total waste.

Our Community