I took a Flix bus from Portland to Seattle and back.
From Portland to Seattle it was great. Five minute walk from my apartment. Friendly driver. Not crowded. Internet. Charger. Space above my seat to store stuff. Comfortable ride.
On the way back though it was a totally different story.
I was scheduled to leave Seattle at 7:55pm at the 6th Ave S & S Lane St stop. Then at 3:36pm I get an email from them saying that they had to cancel my ride. WUT!!! No text message or call either. Fortunately I was on my laptop and saw the email in time, but what if I wasn't?
I think this is absolutely terrible. I easily could have missed the email and been stuck in Seattle having to find a hotel at the last minute.
Since I saw the email, I was able to reschedule. I took the 5:20pm option that leaves from "Seattle Bus Station" which is at 503 S Royal Brougham Way, 98134 Seattle and "Operated by MTR Western as FlixBus".
I get there 15 minutes early, like they ask, but... well... I was confused.
- It was a Greyhound Station. It didn't say "Seattle Bus Station" anywhere.
- There was no one else waiting. I was the only one. Even a few minutes before 5:20pm. This made me think I was in the wrong place. I'd expect there to be at least a dozen or so other people like me waiting to board.
- The Greyhound Station was closed. So it wasn't like I could walk inside and ask an employee or something for clarification.
- There were two different parking lots outside the Greyhound Station and if it even was the right place, I wasn't sure which parking lot it would be, so I tried to frantically keep an eye on both.
- Adding to the confusion, it was this weird sketchy area underneath a huge highway with lots of stuff going on. Including a huge depot or something for city buses. So I was nervous that one of the areas with the city buses was actually "Seattle Bus Station" as opposed to the Greyhound Station being "Seattle Bus Station". There were also random city buses parked all over the place, and I wasn't sure if I misjudged a city bus to be the Flix bus I was supposed to board.
- 5:20pm passes and no bus arrives.
- At around 5:25pm I see a MTR Western bus arrive in one of the Greyhound Station parking lots. So I walk up to the driver, ask if he's with Flix bus, he is, but he says he's just dropping off, not picking up, and I'm probably waiting for a different bus that will come after his.
- So I walk back to the other parking lot. But then I decide to walk back and ask the guy for more clarification.
- He says again that he's not picking up here, just dropping off. So I start elaborating that I'm going to Portland and am worried I'll miss my bus and ask if he can help me make sure I'm in the right place for my bus. He asks for my ticket. I show him. He asks when I got it. I explain that they cancelled my initial trip and just got this one like two hours ago. He realizes that it's his bus and he must not have gotten the notice or something since it was two hours ago and tells me to board his bus.
So yeah. Wtf. I easily could have missed my bus. Poor communication. They should have made absolutely sure to communicate with the drivers, get affirmation from the drivers that they know what's going on, have pictures of the pick up locations so that it's visually clear where you're supposed to be, and provide text message updates if a bus is running late. There should also be large signs saying something like "Flix bus boarding location here". I dunno, probably a bunch of other stuff too.
And regarding the cancellation, I _kinda_ get it. There probably weren't enough passengers and to it wouldn't be profitable for them to run the route. And tickets are very cheap. If your offering is "the tickets will be cheap in exchange for the timing being unpredictable", that's valid.
However, if that is indeed what you're offering, you need to be absolutely clear about that to your customers. That way customers know what they're getting into and consent to it. Instead, the whole "we might cancel your trip at the very last minute" thing was probably hidden in the fine print somewhere which I see as quite unethical.
Oh, and on the trip back the internet stopped working after 20 minutes or so. "Error: time quota limit exceeded".
PS: I find it odd that on Yelp there is a different FlixBus business page for each drop off/pick up location. As a customer I want to know what FlixBus is like overall as a company. They probably do it per-location so that customers only see a handful of 1 star reviews as opposed to thousands and can rationalize to themselves that it's just a small sample size. read more