Exceeding the Award

There is a rule which says a bus driver must not work more than 5 hours in one stretch. I don’t know if this is a government regulation or part of the union agreement (which is sometimes called an ‘award’). To go beyond the 5 hours is referred to as ‘exceeding the award’.

If a driver is running late and is about to start a route which, due to its scheduled length, would cause the driver to work more than the 5 hours, the driver is meant to report it to the Radio Room and the route is cancelled. However, if the driver starts the route on time but runs late during the route (causing the driver to work more than 5 hours) the driver finished the route.

Yesterday I exceeded the award but it was, in my opinion, due to poor roster design.

The roster I worked had a ‘first half’ (before the meal break) of 4 hours and 55 minutes. Not much room for error. The last 2 routes I was scheduled to do were ‘school specials’ (picking up children from school). I had arrived about 5 minutes late for the 1st one (due to finishing the previous route late). Near the end of the 1st school special I encountered delays due to road work, delaying me a further 10 minutes. When I contacted the Radio Room it was already time from me to start the 2nd school special but it was going to take me at least 10 minutes to get to the school.

School specials are never cancelled (the kids cannot be left to make their own way home). But I could not do it due to the 5 hour limit. This meant I returned to the depot and another bus was sent from the depot to do the route I couldn’t

It seems poor roster design for me to be assigned the school specials in these circumstances.