Complaints double as Sydney bus services fail to meet targets

Private operators of Sydney’s bus services are regularly failing to meet on-time running targets and are not adequately dealing with complaints, leading to a rebuke of the state’s transport agency for its handling of multibillion-dollar contracts.

In a highly critical report, NSW Auditor-General Bola Oyetunji found that bus operators were below a target of 95 per cent on-time running most of the time between January 2023 and May last year. In the 17-month period, bus operators met or beat the target in only 15 per cent of instances.

All of Sydney’s 10 bus regions are operated by private companies, which are contracted by the state government.Credit: Steven Siewert

While the rate of cancelled and incomplete bus trips has improved since early 2023, the report noted that some bus operators never met performance targets during the 17 months. The target is for no more than 0.5 per cent of services to be cancelled or fail to finish their trips each month.

Six private operators, including Busways, Transit Systems and Keolis Downer, are contracted by the NSW government to provide bus services across 10 regions in Sydney. Nine of the contracts are worth about $8 billion in total, and each is for about eight years.

In a stinging rebuke, the auditor-general said Transport for NSW was “not effectively managing bus contracts” to ensure that companies were meeting performance obligations and passenger needs.

It found the agency has failed to undertake critical measures to manage bus contracts, including analysis of key performance trends and passenger feedback.

The report was critical of Transport for NSW for not carrying out a systematic analysis of customer complaints, which means that the agency was unable to properly direct operators to resolve recurring problems. Among the most common gripes of passengers are buses missing scheduled stops and arriving late or trips not operating.

The number of customer complaints in May last year was about double that in April 2022 – almost 29 complaints per 100,000 boardings compared to more than 14 – reflecting growing passenger dissatisfaction.

The audit office also warned that a condition in contracts is hindering Transport for NSW’s ability to fix performance service gaps. Contracts require that changes – such as to the number of buses running on a route – have to be at no extra cost to the government if they are initiated by operators within the first two years.

It has recommended that Transport for NSW increase the strategic capability of its bus contracts team to address gaps by June, as well as start regular audits of companies’ response to customer complaints.

In a letter to the auditor-general, Transport for NSW secretary Josh Murray said it recognised that “ongoing, targeted action” was required, which included the need to improve the agency’s capacity.

Murray said measures to resolve a driver shortage had had a “real impact”, citing a drop in vacancies from about 600 in September 2022 to 149 this month.

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