Re: Intercity Bus travel reviews What an awesome thread.
Ok about me. I live in Bangalore and I work and partially live in Hyderabad. With weekends being off that means every Thursday I spend half of my day trying to work out a way to reach Bangalore. Mind you this is no simple exercise. This involves a lot of planning, hit and miss and precise planning that includes cost, place of departure, departure time, travel time, arrival time, drop points at Bangalore. In fact I am so obsessed about it that now it seems to be a hobby for me.
So I reach work at 9:30 Am and the first thing that I do is log on to IRCTC. Please don’t ask me why but that’s where the treasure hunt starts. I guess anyone who manages to get a Hyderabad - Bangalore train ticket on Thursday morning should buy themselves a something nice. It is no minor achievement. But then I think it’s the worst option.
1. You would have to leave work by 5
2. No food and most of the times the washrooms are not clean.
3. Drop at SBC, that means again fighting with the auto guys and actually spending more money to reach home.
But still, I log in -> Enter details ->Communication error -> Absolute panic -> log back -> repeat process -> give up -> Look for a bus
But it’s fun. an absolute adreline rush.
I have been doing this for quite some time now and what I am gonna do now is list my small feedback/ review/ opinion of the different travels that I have used in the last 7 months
Quick Demographics -
Hyderabad - Banjara Hills
Bangalore - HSR Layout
1. State Govt guys (KSRTC and APSRTC) - The first thought that comes to your mind when you think of the above is "inter state buses" but my dear friends you all would be very very surprised (especially KSRTC). Their fleet of buses are amazing and I have heard some great stuff about their staff behavior and punctuality. But it doesn’t work for me. For me to board a KSRTC bus I would have to go to the MGBS first and then it will drop me off at Majestic. So again that same old fight with the auto guys. not worth it. But still they are highly recommended. The best part is that they do not change their prices as per demand and are pretty stable.
2. VRL / SRS – I had read and heard some very bad reviews about VRL, but honestly I guess they are very good. For starters their Non AC bus to Bangalore starts at 400 and Multi axle at about 750. The buses are always very clean and the staff behavior is also very good. The two things that bother me are, (A). Punctuality and (B). Increase in prices. I have travelled several times with them and a couple of the time the buses arrive late at the pickup point. One time I had to wait for 1.5 hours for the 10 PM bus to arrive. Second they seem to be very shameless in increasing their prices. 400 becomes 650 and 750 becomes 1200 in no time during weekends.
3. Kallada – well me mallu people like me Kallada is always the first option and why not. Their service is excellent. Recently they started their operations to and from Hyderabad and their timings are awesome. Their first bus leaves at 4 PM from Medhipatnam and reaches Bangalore by about 12.30 which is amazing. The best thing that I Like about them is their excellent feeder bus service. They drop you at Medhipatnam at about 6 Am and then they have a feeder bus that would drop you further in the city. I think and excellent idea where an auto guys charges 150 for a ride for net even 5 KM.
4. HKB / Orange – I have nothing but praise for these guys. I don’t know who the management is but this is how a bus service should be rum. Extremely neat buses, very courteous staff, and they don’t hesitate to give you a bottle of water, cookies for your travel. The best part is that their fares are fixed most of the time.
4. Diwakar, SVR, Jabbar, National – They have very good Volvos, and their service spread is also very good but one thing that puts you off is the staff behavior. This is one thing that I noticed in all of them. Second problem is that I have seen all of them stop at major cities to pickup people so that the staff could make some quick buck. This one time I was travelling in SVR and the driver stopped at about 100 KM from Hyderabad and close to 10-12 men rushed in and occupied the seats that were vacant. Now this could be potentially very dangerous IMHO. But one thing that really works for all of them is their excellent service spread. They have all kinds of busses (AC / Non AC/ Volvo/ Multi axle/Sleeper)
5. Finally the bad boys – Akbar / Saleem / Sahara / Omer / Rajesh and others… Well can’t comment much about them. But what I have seen is that they are more of commodity mover than people movers. Traveled with them a couple of times and the experience was just bad in all aspects. Will always be my last option.
My 2 cents on when the world is playing Holi and i had to come to work to do nothing. |