U-Go Mobility boss Daniel Corbin says challenges of running buses much the same anywhere in world

The company is still about 75 drivers short of the number needed to restore the 314 trips a week that were cut from the timetable last month.

Managing director Daniel Corbin told the Leader there were "40-45 new drivers in the pipeline, with about 25 in training, but it will take a considerable amount of time for them to progress to driving solo"

The company is seeking drivers for its four depots at Kingsgrove, Revesby, Taren Point and Menai. The advertised full time pay is $28 - $36 per hour.

A $500 million, seven-year contract was awarded to U-Go Mobility, which is a joint venture between Cimic Group's services company UGL and British based Go-Ahead.

UGL is involved in rail, tram and light rail operations in Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Canberra, but has not previously run bus services. Go-Ahead has operated buses in major cities such as London.

Mr Corbin, who was previously head of operations for Go Ahead in Singapore, was called to Sydney to take over after the initial debacle.

He denied U-Go Mobility was unprepared to run the former Transdev and Kingsgrove Bus Company services from July 1.

Mr Corbin said that, in addition to there being a nation-wide shortage of bus drivers, merging bus regions 5 and 10 was "quite a complex change".

"We merged two different businesses and we did have a small number of [bus driver] leavers, who didn't come over and then some leavers left on day 1," he said.

"There's a lot of detail in it, why we find we're in the position we're in. But the key is the driver shortage, and that's the main focus."

Mr Corbin said he couldn't comment on why individual drivers left on "day 1". "The key for me is to make this better and that's why I am working day and night with my team."

Mr Corbin denied the company lacked local knowledge and experience.

"U-Go have a lot of local and international experience when it comes to running buses," he said.

"We have a lot of people, who are local to Sydney. UGL is a local business. We were supported from our ownership to have local context.

"I have been doing this for 18 years. I have always done bus. I have worked internationally, in London, in Singapore. Running buses and the challenges you face doing that are predominantly the same no matter where you are in the world.

"And, we do have people here who have the local context, so when you are bringing all that together in U-go we know what we are doing, we know how to run bus operations. The issue here is we don't have bus drivers. We are not the only operator affected."

Asked about the management change, Mr Corbin said, "The community spoke loud and clear they were not happy. I was brought in from Singapore. I am here to fix it.

"We are working with TfNSW to bring stability and working towards a better timetable and then a full timetable. We are going to follow the plan. we are going to fix this."

Mr Corbin said school services had been prioritised.

"We have done a lot of work on it," he said. "I have a dedicated schools liaison person, who is meeting with schools. School are in a very good place at the moment."

Complaints about buses not showing up or running late continue.

Gareth Edwards copied the Leader into an email to the bus company.

"This is my usual complaint about the 967 service [on October 19] not showing up at Miranda," he wrote. Despite U-Go's promises this is again the last service of the day.

"Of course I will be lodging the usual complaint with Transport for NSW. From now on I will be attaching my taxi receipts for expenses incurred due to the non-appearance of U-go Mobility's services. Can I expect a refund?"

David Stakes, of Woronora, wrote: "Just another tale of incompetence, again the 965 Woronora service. three days in a row now has been missing once and over 15 minutes late the other times. How are you expected to get anywhere on time with this standard of service?"

"Sorry but this is not good enough, I don't care what TFNSW want to do. As a taxpayer I demand this contract must be torn up, and given to someone who knows how to run a bus service."