r/Glasgow Tools

I used to work for first, left about 13 year ago to drive wagons. They pay shit, I think I was on something like £150 a week, I went to £450 driving wagons (and now I’m on about £750). Your day can be 13/14 hours long, dragged out with split shifts. The rotas were awful, you’d get to pick yours based on length of service, so if you were new, you got the absolute dregs. You also got paid less as a new driver, the senior guys were on something like £250 a week. I had to pay back for my license so that was coming off the wage too. At that time the buses were all ancient and would breakdown all the time, half the fleet weren’t low floor wheelchair accessible. The company treated you like absolute shit too. They fired a lot of new drivers, you don’t have much security in a new job in your first year. I was fired for running a temporary red light, even though I was already committed to the other lane before the light changed. Didn’t matter, it was a chance to get rid of me and get another poor sucker in and get another grant for training another new driver and suck £2k out of them. The place was a revolving door. I hated it. I’d be so exhausted I’d be falling asleep at the wheel, I wasn’t the only one. It was monotonous, you were monitored constantly, EVERYTHING you’d do was monitored, and you had inspectors hiding all over routes waiting to get you. Idled for 20 seconds too long in the city? Reported, sanctioned. No eating or drinking on the bus, the commissioner hated that. No toilets either. Wait 3 hours till your run was over to go to the toilet. It was the worst job and the worst company I’ve ever worked for. They would sell their granny to make a buck. Absolutely fuck first bus.