School Bus Fleet Magazine Forums
Home | Profile | Register | Active Topics | Members | Search | FAQ
 All Forums
 Management/Operations
 Enter Forum: Management/Operations
 Field Trips
 New Topic  Reply to Topic
 Printer Friendly
Author Previous Topic Topic Next Topic  

Wedey
New Member

4 Posts

Posted - 12/15/2003 :  09:25:44 AM  Show Profile  Reply with Quote
I have a few questions I hope you can help me with.

How does your districts handle field trips that occur during route times?

Also what procedure or policy do you use when there are too many trips requested for the number of available buses and drivers?

I hope you can give me an ideal of how your company handles this problem.

Anything will help.

Jim
Top Member

USA
581 Posts

Posted - 12/15/2003 :  10:43:59 AM  Show Profile  Reply with Quote
For field trips during route times, full time drivers take those trips, and a substitute covers that driver's regular route. But this is only if there are enough substitute drivers available. Regular routes transporting kids to and from school take priority over field trips and athletic trips. The main problem we run into sometimes is some of these trips (mostly athletic) that want to leave early in the afternoons, especially between 2 pm and 4 pm. If there are enough subs available, we are able to do this and a sub will cover the driver's route. If there aren't enough subs available, the teams simply have no choice but to wait until after 4 pm when the drivers finish their routes, or find other means of transportation. We always try to accomodate these trips, but sometimes we simply can not do it if we have no drivers.

As for too many trips and not enough drivers and buses, we don't usually run into that problem. We have plenty of drivers who depend on these trips for the extra money they make. But I guess if we ever did run into that problem, it would go by the order in which the groups turned in their trip request form. The earlier they turn in their request, the better guarantee we can give them for getting a bus.
Go to Top of Page

thomas86_a
Top Member

USA
4413 Posts

Posted - 12/15/2003 :  5:25:34 PM  Show Profile  Visit thomas86_a's Homepage  Send thomas86_a an AOL message  Reply with Quote
Regular drivers take field trips (optional they don't have to take them) and a sub driver is brought in to cover their route. We don't usually run out of buses, but if occasionally we do we borrow a bus from another district.

If you have an International, you NEED customer service.
Go to Top of Page

thomas91
Advanced Member

USA
212 Posts

Posted - 12/15/2003 :  5:57:41 PM  Show Profile  Reply with Quote
We operate the same way thomas86_a said, although we've never run out of buses. We have approx. 30-32 buses assigned to routes and 8 or so spare buses.
Go to Top of Page

CrazyBusDriver78
Senior Member

USA
71 Posts

Posted - 12/16/2003 :  08:31:03 AM  Show Profile  Send CrazyBusDriver78 an AOL message  Click to see CrazyBusDriver78's MSN Messenger address  Send CrazyBusDriver78 a Yahoo! Message  Reply with Quote
Here if you accept the trip, they will get a sub to cover your route if needed, If there are more trips then drivers, then the subs can take them, but subs are not allowed to take trips untill they have there own route or like i said, if there are more trips then drivers.
Go to Top of Page

macondriver
Top Member

USA
533 Posts

Posted - 12/27/2003 :  11:02:31 AM  Show Profile  Send macondriver an AOL message  Reply with Quote
when there are to many and not enough to cover it we just asy no.
and the school will go at a later date.....it happens to us all the time. for charters during working hours we have so many schools (37) that start at different times we do front half and back half or drop and returns...one driver that has a school that starts later will take the charter and drop them and a different driver that had early school s and gets done sooner wil go pick them up...or if we can we have the same driver drop then go do their routes and return later sometimes they may have to wait a little but that's ok atleast they are taken care of.
i have read on here about some contracts that have just charter drivers , they do not do routes or anything but charters. and that is really cool, but where i am it is union and we can not do anything like that.

Driving my way to the top, in a big yellow bus...and proud of it.
Go to Top of Page
  Previous Topic Topic Next Topic  
 New Topic  Reply to Topic
 Printer Friendly
Jump To:
 


School Bus Fleet Magazine Forums © 2022 School Bus Fleet Magazine Go To Top Of Page
This page was generated in 0.08 seconds. Snitz Forums 2000