I used to travel Greyhound a lot during my college days. Although not the lap of luxury it was a decent and inexpensive way to travel. I decided that since I didn't have any time constraints on a recent trip to Dallas that I would take the time to see the middle of Texas. I purchased my ticket online 2 days in advance. With a paid ticket and confirmation in hand I went to the assigned station, the Greyhound Station in Downtown El Paso, Tx, at the appointed time. Although I'm not afraid of local culture and ambiance what I saw did not inspire great confidence in this company. The station was unkempt, seedy and the few workers didn't seem to care if you patronized their company or not.
At my travel time I lined up for my bus. The bus arrived, picked up only a few passengers and curtly told the overflow that they needed to take their concerns to the ticket agent. Apparently, the bus was nearly full from some other originating point.
I made my way to the ticket counter, as did the other passengers. There was one passenger, who jokingly said to no one in particular that the situation sucked and should be remedied by Greyhound by getting another bus ready. At that point one of the ticket agents took offense and got into a verbal exchange with the customer that I thought would turn physical. He told him to keep quiet, since he "didn't speak for the rest of the customers" and wait his turn.
My ticket agent told me that I could take the bus 2 hours later. I was also told that if I wanted to be assured a seat on the next bus I needed to go two blocks away where the bus originated. I guess a paid ticket and confirmation were not enough. One also needed to fight the crowds in another non-Greyhound station.
I asked the agent why the bus had been nearly full of passengers. She told me that Greyhound could not track the number of tickets sold on any given day since some tickets were sold manually through non-Greyhound agents and not entered into the Greyhound computer system. So, starting from another station and an inaccurate passengers count was the cause of my problems. At least the agent was 'gracious' enough to exchange my ticket for the later travel time without charging me the exchange fee.
At the appointed time, two hours later, again, I stood in line for the bus and was transported back to the past. The same event happened. The bus was nearly full and again there were several dozen passengers left stranded. I made my way to the ticket counter agent. For nearly two hours I waited my turn along with some very irate and stranded customers.in that time I witnessed all manner of incompetence from the lone 2 ticket agents. They were unable to offer much consolation to the customers. Some were given passage on travel the next day; others had to be placed in lodgings since they had missed connections. I was shuffled from one useless line to another before finally talking with an agent. I told the agent that I would cut my losses, vow never to travel Greyhound, and just wanted my money back. He placed me back in the line that I had started in the hour before only to be received incompetently by the other ticket agent. She was on the phone to someone, who I can only assume was someone of authority, quite a number of times. I told the agent that I merely wanted my money back. She curtly processes the application I had been given by the first agent, gave me a copy and told me it would have to be resolved by the corporate office.
From the reviews that I have been reading on this website I got away easy. At least I didn't lose luggage or have to be in Dallas at an appointed time like some of the passengers.
Never again.
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