Stagecoach West

Stagecoach West is one of the largest bus operators in the UK. They are a flagship subsidiary of The Stagecoach Group and house 9 depots across The West of England with a fleet size of 1,500 buses. Their operations span from Banbury to Bristol, transporting over 25 million passengers annually.

“Insite really stood out to us in its willingness to hire new staff and provide vehicles to train the drivers we need, making large scale driving licence acquisition more efficient and cost-effective.”

Martin Gibbon

Stagecoach West Operations Director

Scaling up driver capacity for Stagecoach West

With rising demand and limited internal resources, Stagecoach West partnered with Insite to expand training capacity. A bespoke setup helped them clear their backlog, improve pass rates, and train more drivers every month.

85%

First-time pass rate (Cat D)

+12/month

Extra drivers trained monthly

Challenge

Demand for buses in the regions Stagecoach West covers was skyrocketing
Already qualified PCV drivers were becoming increasingly more difficult to recruit due to scarcity
Internal driver training academy could not keep up with demand of pre-qualified drivers being recruited
Needed to relieve pressure from employed driver trainers as this was impacting quality/training times
Bus driver shortage causing issues with route scheduling and usual services facing disruptions

Solution & results

Insite created a bespoke plan focused entirely on licence acquisition for Stagecoach West. Embedding our own PCV training vehicles and trainers within Stagecoach West, we were able to drastically increase the training capacity that they could utilise when we work in-tandem with their driver academy, along with taking the necessary steps to reduce the size of their backlog from Day 1.

Our trainers focus solely on licence acquisition and achieved results of 85% first time pass rates for Cat D practical training.
Freed up the time of Stagecoach West’s inhouse trainers, who can then focus their resources on CPC, Theory and Company Ethos training
Added the ability to train an additional 12 drivers per month (soon moving to 24 per month)
Training times per candidate shortened by upwards of a month
Flexibility to train candidates at whichever depot they were based through our roaming vehicle and trainer solution
Created a system, managed by our head of driver trainers, where Stagecoach West were always aware and guaranteed a certain number of candidates we could train over a set period of time, which helped them make the necessary future plans for their business and meet the demands of their clients along with promoting business growth.

Challenge

Demand for buses in the regions Stagecoach West covers was skyrocketing
Already qualified PCV drivers were becoming increasingly more difficult to recruit due to scarcity
Internal driver training academy could not keep up with demand of pre-qualified drivers being recruited
Needed to relieve pressure from employed driver trainers as this was impacting quality/training times
Bus driver shortage causing issues with route scheduling and usual services facing disruptions

Solution & result

Our trainers focus solely on licence acquisition and achieved results of 85% first time pass rates for Cat D practical training.
Freed up the time of Stagecoach West’s inhouse trainers, who can then focus their resources on CPC, Theory and Company Ethos training
Added the ability to train an additional 12 drivers per month (soon moving to 24 per month)
Training times per candidate shortened by upwards of a month
Flexibility to train candidates at whichever depot they were based through our roaming vehicle and trainer solution
Created a system, managed by our head of driver trainers, where Stagecoach West were always aware and guaranteed a certain number of candidates we could train over a set period of time, which helped them make the necessary future plans for their business and meet the demands of their clients along with promoting business growth.

Ready to take the stress away from driver training?

Get in touch to reduce your driver training completion times, increase first time pass rates and
reduce costs.