Trentbarton needs to recruit 130 more drivers
The company thanked customers for their patience
- Published
Regional bus operator Trentbarton has revealed it currently has 130 driver vacancies.
The company, which runs dozens of routes around the East Midlands, was forced to cancel 1,614 individual trips in a two-week period in August due to staff shortages.
Trentbarton said the "unavoidable" cancellations made up only 3% of its services in this period.
The company has thanked customers for their patience.
'Tackling the problem'
The figures, for the two weeks from 3 August, were collected by the Local Democracy Reporting Service.
They revealed more than 200 individual timed services were cancelled on the 6 August.
A company spokesperson said: “The national shortage of bus drivers has been caused by a variety of factors, including Covid retirements and absences, migration of bus drivers to logistics jobs, and strikes and delays at the driver licensing authority.
"Our driving team currently has 130 vacancies – 17% short of what we would need to run a full timetable.
"That shows how well our drivers are doing to only lose three per cent of timetabled services.
“Our thanks go to our customers for their understanding and patience whilst we tackle the problem.”