Day in the Life of a Driver - Episode 1 Part B

Day in the Life of a Driver - Episode 1 Part B : The Owner's Story

How Integrity Coach Lines came to be

 

To read Part A, which explains how Integrity Lines started, click here….

In the prior episode, Ross Sims, the owner of Integrity Coach Lines explained, that the first service started with 1 passenger on the coach and he was asking himself “What have I done?”  Here’s how it went after that….

We had committed just about everything we had to this new venture and it just had to work!  All cleaning, servicing and repairing on our only coach was carried out by Barbara, my partner in the business at the time, and myself.  Luckily, I am a qualified mechanic.  We were working 7 days a week on this and it was our only form of income.  Slowly over the next few months we started to grow to the point where we were able to pay ourselves a small wage, this was the way it was for 18 months.

The Shire of Exmouth made contact with us and made enquires about the service extending to Coral Bay and Exmouth.  After loads more paperwork work to the relevant authorities, our RPT licence (regular passenger transport) was extended to include these towns.  The service grew especially during the peak season May to October and by this time we had some very loyal passengers and friends traveling with us.  By this time we had purchased another coach. Feeling like we could do no wrong we had an eye on Broome.  Off went all the paper work again and eventually the RPT was extended to Broome, more coaches were purchased, drivers employed and office staff increased and we had our own office in Wellington street bus station

Our first attempt at running between Perth and Broome lasted almost 2 wet seasons then the Qld based coach company complained to the department that their service was no longer viable and unless we were removed from the route they would leave the state. We were disappointed as a short time later we were removed from the Broome service as we were cut back to running between Perth and Carnarvon only.  The “then minister” asked if we would be interested in running the inland services for them instead. So a couple of weeks later our new service started up the inland road once a week Perth to Port Hedland travelling through Mt Magnet, Meekatharra and Newman and return.

Ross-Sims-Integrity-Coach-Lines-MD.jpg

A few small changes have taken place along the way mainly to work in with our other services as they came along.

Then in 2011 the Qld based coach company stopped going in to Exmouth, so again we applied to the department for a license to service between Perth and Exmouth so we were back on the coast road and it was like we had never left our old friends and our customers were back with us.

In March 2013 the Qld based company gave notice to the department they were going to stop the service between Perth and Broome totally, the government of the time asked if we would consider servicing Broome again and after a lot of discussion back and forth an agreement was reached and Integrity Coach Lines was back.  We are now the only express coach company operating the Perth to Broome service.  We have both Express tickets and Hop on Hop off passes.

Now I am the sole owner of Integrity Coach Lines.  With no plans to extend any further we have concentrated on improving what we do and with all our new processes in place the future looks bright.


Courtesy of Ross Sims (Owner)

Posted: 1/04/2019 9:05:01 AM by Judy Purkiss | 1 comments
Filed under: Day in the Life of a Driver

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Pricing Guide

 

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Integrity Coach Lines provide “Express” (point to point) coach tickets, “Hop on Hop off” (multiple destination) tickets and special event coach transport. Whilst we have a vast array of prices for different locations, we have produced a handy ‘Pricing Guide’ that gives you a range and understanding of the different price levels for different types of trips.

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Integrity Coach Lines have produced a detailed pdf brochure, providing full details on our “Express” (point to point) coach service, “Hop on Hop off” Pass (multiple destination) and special event coach transport, as well as information on all our destinations and our coach timetables.

This handy brochure gives you all the information you need on Integrity Coach Lines in one spot, so feel free to save it so you can access all our info when you’re offline.

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