Transport bosses admit there have been “teething problems” with school buses after a switchover that saw the last remaining privately-run services in a region brought back under public control.
Transport for Greater Manchester (TfGM) took over services in the south of the region on 5 January.
But some parents have complained of buses arriving late or not all for pupils in Tameside and Stockport since the switch.
TfGM’s chief network officer Danny Vaughan said initially the performance of school buses had “been a concern” but hoped they were now “a thing of the past”.
The change on 5 January marked the completion of the roll out of the Bee Network, a process of returning all buses in Greater Manchester to public control that began in 2023.
Aftab Marchant from Heaton Chapel said his son had been left frozen by the roadside waiting for buses that never came early in January.
It was one of a number of complaints following the switch, according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service.
“Performance in the first week suffered because of the weather but it was a very very successful switchover,” Mr Vaughan told a Greater Manchester Combined Authority meeting on Thursday.
He said more buses had been added to school service schedules in the areas affected, adding services were now “quite reliable”.
