

Planning for Failure - Greyhound Knows How to Fail - toddcharron
http://www.planningforfailure.com/post/753812919/greyhound-knows-how-to-fail
I had the pleasure of attending Agile Coach Camp Canada this year. It was an amazing experience.  I’ll be writing about that experience in a future post, but in this post, I would like to address what I had to go through just to get to the conference...
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jsdalton
The title of this article is a bit confusing.

Given that the blog itself is called "Planning For Failure," I expected it to
be about how Greyhound "knew" how to fail in a graceful manner. I read through
about halfway until I realized it was just a rant about failure at various
points in Greyhound's ticketing system.

Nothing wrong with that, just not the article I was expecting to read.

~~~
jvdh
True, but almost everyone he came into contact with knew about the failure,
knew it 'happened sometimes', yet still did not know how to fix it! Reading
this, I almost get the impression that it's an elaborate attempt to fail in
the most miserable way possible. Either that or they wanted to create a Kafka
experience.

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grellas
Greyhound's failure happened years ago because of a changing demographic in
America. Small-town America rode buses all over the place between WWI and WWI
and Greyhound prospered in meeting the market demand for this service. At that
time, the interstate highway system did not exist and travel of this type was
best done by bus. With the advent of the freeway system, and with the rise of
modern air travel, the glory days of back-road bus service ended. Greyhound
eventually filed for bankruptcy and, after emerging, has been a ghost of its
old self. "Is this 1958?" the author of this piece asks in amazement. Well,
for a company long operating at the margins, it might as well be and its
customer service appears to be nothing more than a reflection of this reality.

Greyhound's "failure" happened in reality long ago and what we see now is a
company that is among the walking dead. This does not excuse what happened to
this poor, hapless customer but it probably explains it.

~~~
SiVal
The British FirstGroup PLC owns Laidlaw Int'l which owns Greyhound.
FirstGroup, with the tag line "Transforming Travel", seems to see this relic
of America's past as its ticket to Britain's future and features it
prominently on FirstGroup's UK home page. A bankrupted company that is part of
the "holdings" of a clueless company that itself is a property of an
investment vehicle for moneyed "Lords" on the other side of the planet is
about the closest thing the capitalist west has to a Soviet / Chinese / French
government agency in terms of service orientation.

~~~
SiVal
I meant to add "in the private sector." It's a great way to turn a private
company into a pseudo-gov't bureau.

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blahedo
I would have gone for the chargeback _way_ sooner than that, roughly at the
time I had the thought, "why am I jumping through this many hoops for _their_
screwup?"

~~~
tonystubblebine
Definitely. The chargeback is an underutilized feature of credit cards. A
couple of things about chargebacks:

1\. In my experience, you don't need to provide any documentation unless the
merchant disputes your chargeback. So you should keep documentation, receipts,
screen shots, notes, but not worry about filling out a detailed initial
incident report.

2\. Some people have claimed that you risk running afoul of your credit card
if you use this feature too often. I'd say I use it twice per year and I've
never been hassled.

3\. Morally, I think you're just obligated to make a single attempt to rectify
a misunderstanding with a merchant.

4\. My credit cards let me fill out a report online, which makes this
extremely convenient.

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justinph
Despite all the hate for American Express's laughably weak passwords, they
make incredibly easy to dispute a charge. There's literally a button by every
transaction on listed in your account, just begging for you to click it.

~~~
drusenko
actually amex are also the best for chargebacks from a merchant's perspective.
they have an online interface you can log-in to and instantly see inquiries,
fraud and chargebacks, and respond immediately.

they're also excellent about managing chargebacks, like when a chargeback
comes through and you've already given a refund. this is so frustrating with
Visa -- they'll actually still process the chargeback and ding you $20, _even
though you've already given the money back_.

~~~
dannyv
The standard chargeback fee for a merchant is $25 per disputed transaction,
regardless of if the customer's dispute is valid or not.

AMEX not only provides the best interface to manage chargebacks, but they also
don't charge a chargeback fee at all.

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ggchappell
> You want to plan for failure? Start by not caring about your customers. Be
> just like Greyhound and you’ll achieve failure soon enough.

> Quality and service matter.

> Those who care, win.

Well, maybe. I mean I see his point, but the fact remains that Greyhound is
probably the most successful bus company in the U.S. Could it be that customer
service is not as critical to business success as the writer claims it is? I
mean I _wish_ it were, but this is reality we're talking about.

~~~
kiba
The minimum capital I can think of for entering the bus transportation market
is well, big long comfortable bus with all the whistle and doodads, fuels, a
driver who doesn't crash the bus, and a machine to receive money. Then you
need money for paying mechanics, accountants, and gods know what else.

So it might be that Greyhound just doesn't have a whole lot of competition due
to high barrier of entry.

~~~
ojbyrne
Well in the DC-NYC-Boston corridor they have a ton of competition. Because all
you really need is one bus you can drive yourself (or you and your extended
family). Google "Chinatown Bus."

~~~
phsr
Fung Wah, from Boston <-> NY for something like $15. For a while, it seemed
like every week there was news of another Fung Wah accident, whether it be
hitting the Mass Pike toll booths or tipping over on the on ramp. They should
have advertised "$15 for an ADVENTURE"

~~~
Kadin
Even better, there was a period of time (somewhere around 2003-2004 IIRC) when
the CT police decided that shaking down the Fung Wah bus would be a great way
to make their narcotics quota. Supposedly it was being used by drug mules.
They were stopping the (northbound only?) busses just south of Sturbridge MA
seemingly daily, and about once a week there'd be a story of "$LARGEQUANTITY
of $NARCOTIC confiscated from Boston-NYC Bus".

I'm not quite sure what the MO of the drug transporters was; I never heard of
any arrests so I think they must have been using it basically as a moving dead
drop.

The few times I took it though were, sadly, uneventful. One lady did have a
live chicken with her, but that was about it.

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jrockway
As I was reading this, I kept chanting "charge... back! charge... back!
charge... back!" in the back of my mind. I was happy to find that that's
exactly how he resolved the situation.

Never do a big company a favor, especially when they won't return it. Sure, he
could have gotten his money back by faxing stuff and mailing stuff and being
glued to the phone for a day. Or he could fill out a form on his credit card's
website, and now Greyhound has to do all the dirty work. Which would you
choose?

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atiw
I had the EXACT same experience. Same situation, same results.

Although I never called my credit card company to do a charge back. In fact,
right until this moment, I did not even know I can do this. It's been a year
now. I am a cofounder and sole developer of a startup, and I am working full
time to pay my bills and for immigration purposes. Basically, I figured I
would rather not waste time at all, since I am really out of it. So do you
think it might be worth a shot to even try to get that charge back from my
credit card company, after almost a year? In my opinion, it might lead to more
issues. It's 50 bucks. What do you suggest? Worth my time?

~~~
tomsaffell
AMEX are very good about refunding transactions up to 3 months old - after
that it is more difficult. (very good == one easy phone call, instant
temporary refund, they send you lots of letters (for months)(bad), they
eventually decide to make the refund permanent).

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JeremyStein
Ah, I love the ending! Aren't credit cards great? They actually believe their
customers when you tell them you didn't get something.

~~~
hga
I suspect they too know this "happens sometimes" with Greyhound.

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chaosmachine
Greyhound service is terrible, but they can get away with it because they're
the cheapest way to get from one side of the country to the other. It's a 4
day ride, the seats won't recline, it smells like someone crapped in their
pants, the terminals are scary, and your luggage will get lost, but you save a
few hundred over the next cheapest option.

(I did toronto to vancouver and back a couple years ago. It's 8 days you won't
soon forget!)

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joe_the_user
If you're going coast to coast in the US with advanced notice, a plane ticket
can often be cheaper.

~~~
robryan
Might be something to do with lots of luggage? I'd imagine this would be a lot
cheaper on a bus than on a plane?

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joejohnson
That same thing happened to me. I sent my extra, unused ticket reciept in to
their corporate office in Texas and they sent me a refund in a mere six weeks.

This company seems to have a monopoly in the long-distance bus service market.
I also think the majority of their business is done offline (in-person sales
at stations). So, unfortunately, these terrible systems aren't likely to
change anytime soon.

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klous
This is ripe for The Consumerist website. I suggest if it's available in your
area, take the Megabus over Greyhound. Free Wifi on board.

~~~
jat850
That's actually not a bad recommendation. If I've inferred correctly from the
article, the writer is from Canada, and I am as well. Bus service choices are
pretty limited in Canada.

Megabus, for example, only travels between about 6 or 7 cities in eastern
Ontario and Quebec. Being from western Canada, our choices are incredibly
limited here - Greyhound between major destinations along the Trans Canada
highway, basically, or a regional carrier.

That said, the bus is one of my favourite ways to travel, as I very much enjoy
having the option to read, code, sleep, etc. on long journeys. This is the
same reason I enjoy train travel.

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Naga
I took my share of Greyhound trips from Ottawa to Toronto, because it was
cheaper than VIA Rail was. The last straw was when the bus that I was to take
from Toronto to where I live left two hours early, leaving me stranded in
Toronto at 6 AM after taking a 5 hour bus ride from Ottawa. Thank God for GO
Transit.

What I really hate about them is that they have a schedule, but not really.
They constantly sell more tickets than there are seats on the bus. The good
part about this is that since your ticket isn't connected to a bus, you can
take one any time on that day. But then of course 200 people try to get on an
80 person bus. It's a terrible mess.

To make matters worse, none of the other bus companies in Southern Ontario
actually go to Ottawa, so its Greyhound or nothing.

So now I only take the train. It is always a pleasant trip. Definitely worth
the price.

~~~
delano
I only take the train now too.

Experience on Greyhound: forced to buy two tickets for the same trip.
Experience on VIA Rail: picture with the Stanley Cup.

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joblessjunkie
When I imagine riding the bus, I would never expect fancy web pages and
automated credit card processing. You want modern efficiency, try the airport.

Bus travelers purchase tickets in person, on the day of travel, with wadded up
old paper currency. That's the way it's always been, and always will be.

~~~
dasil003
Did you just mention efficiency and the place where TSA cretin squad plants
their fat asses in the same sentence?

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lsc
the interesting lesson here for everyone who accepts credit cards is this:
think you don't have a satisfaction guaranteed, money back policy? think
again.

Now, I don't think this is a bad thing, but I wonder why more businesses don't
offer a money back guarantee as policy straight up? I mean, if the customer
wants their money back, the customer will get their money back; there's not
much you can do about it. So why not have a liberal money back policy
yourself? it prevents most chargebacks (but not all... some consumers are
either just jerks or assume you will give them the run-around, those people
will initiate chargebacks even if you do have an easy money-back policy) and
you get a lot more goodwill out of a refund you give than out of a chargeback.

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Tichy
"Agile Coach Camp Canada"

Ironically, it sounds as if he is going to a conference about improving public
transport.

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marze
It is ridiculous to assume this situation exists as a result of lack of
capability on Greyhound's part. It exists because they make more money this
way from people who can't figure out how to make Greyhound give them their
money back. Why change it and reduce revenue?

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alanh
So hard not to rage in sympathy-frustration while reading this

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ethan
It's not just tickets, every part of the Greyhound experience is piss-poor.
Never again.

