Hi everybody,
I am back with my next review with all hopes to make it more interesting to read...This time its all about a travels portal redbus.in.
About redbus:
The name may seem funky to most of you when you pronounce it for the first timeand you may be wondering whats this about.This is an online portal to book bus tickets (yes bus tickets for air busses)in a group of private busses (mostly in south india).If this sounds silly ask a Bangalorean or your chennai pals about the pains in getting set for your journey with a ticket in a decent travels during peak days. Bus tickets during peak days (read as all fridays and on long vacations) are the most valuable thing that people are crazy about to travel to their destinations if they are away for work reasons.Redbus is a newly started portal that is very much better than any of the online booking portals currently up and running.
A comparison:
This may sound more meaningful for south Indians as I doubt if these bus services are available anywhere in North India.
KPN travels: This is the only popular bus service that I know operates in the entire stretch of south India. The size of cargo that they load in these buses and the importance those people give to load cargos (time spent to load them on the way to your journey) gives you a clear notion that this is a cargo transport service clubbed with human beings. You got to travel with cargos and suffer endless waits in different places of your journey untill the bus is fully set to go.To add on to the pain the comfort is miserable and if you are unfortunate enough no one could help you from the bed bugs all the night that you carry home as a free gift from this travels.
KSRTC: In one word I should say the service is awesome for the number of buses available and the different degree of comfort that you get for the cost that you pay.But the flop side is all about non people oriented approach. Its again a poor government run enterprise where no one cares for anything. You ask any question to get no replies.Very badly the online reservation system does not work for no valid reasons.You find a link for online reservation in KSRTC website but it never works and you have no information about why it does not work.My guess is they have to support all private players and other booking agents who should have bribed officials there to cut this service to customers.Its all about notorious beaurocracy that we got to live with.To put it simply you never get tickets to travel in these buses when you need to.
Indian Railways:Needless to say about the comfort that you can enjoy in railsbut again you never get tickets to travel in train when you need to.I hope any Indian will agree with my view regarding this.
Back to Redbus:
I can strongly recommended redbus for the following reasons:
In time travel:
Most of the times you can enjoy in time point to point service.In my experience I have never suffered long waits to board the bus or during travel for loading or unloading cargos.They do carry cargos sometimes but they deal with it offline after the last point.
Cost:
Surprisingly the cost of ticket is less than any private operators.Added to this there is no extra charge for online booking this is not the case with others where you end up paying 15 bugs extra for online booking.
Customer service:
Service is simply excellent.I was completely taken away by surprise when I got to know the online chat support where customers can have a live chat with support agents.I do not think no Indian company of this grade provides such value addedservices to ease customers life.
User friendly:
In the website with in a few clicks you can get to know if tickets are available for your journey that too in one shot for all the different buses.You have the freedom of selecting the bus as per the timing and proceed further to select your seating based on the seating chart.You need not use your credit card for payment.They provide you an option to use your bank account transfer for those who do not have cards.The print out that you get is in a neat format that looks more like a ticket.Thanks for the potential competition provided by private operators service in every such customer centric sector is getting better day by day with the aid of latest technologies.
If you think its long way to go for us to get the status of a developed nation, think again...With such a world class service and comfort the transformation of the status mentioned above is very much in progress and we are on our way to get more developed than the developed once. Do I sound too greedy?? Lets wait and watch.
Thats it friends!
Sorry if this appears too long to read.Having dragged you upto this line its my pleasure to thank you for your patience in knowing whats this all about.
Though I have tried with all the best of writing skills to make this review an apt one I am sure there are lots of scope for betterment which is possiblewith your valuable comments and feedbacks.
Please do not hesitate to jot down a few words about this in the comments column.
You can always reach me through ssridharb4u@gmail.com
Thanks again,
Sridhar,
Bangalore