Tendered services

Plymouth City Council Tendered Bus Service Network

Plymouth City Council provides financial support for 10 bus services that operate within our city boundary. Without this support, these services would be deemed commercially unviable and would not operate.

The services currently supported by the Council are:

*Please note that the 13S will only operate on school days until 9.28am

Bus Subsidy Ring Fenced Grant (BSOG)

Whilst the majority of funding for these services comes from the Council’s own budgets, each year we receive a grant from the Department for Transport (DfT) known as BSOG.

From 2020 to 2021 the Council have received a grant of £85,008 which will be used in supporting and maintaining the current tendered services network.

Better Deal for Buses Funding

In 2020-21 the Council were successful in securing a further grant from the DfT through the Better Deal for Buses fund, totalling £137,345.

In the 2020-21 financial year £55,495 was spent supporting a number of the services in the table above. Without this funding, it is likely that some of these services would have been withdrawn given the significant drop in passenger numbers resulting from the pandemic. The remaining monies will be spent on continuing to support these services from 2021 to 2022.

A copy of the Statement of Intent submitted to the DfT can be found below:

Local Transport Authority Covid Bus Service Support Grant (LTA CBSSG)

The Department for Transport (DfT) has provided additional funding to Local Transport Authorities to support bus operators by helping cover the additional costs they have incurred on the tendered bus service network resulting from the pandemic.

In the initial Tranche of funding, LTA CBSSG, Plymouth City Council were awarded £98,557 to cover the period from 17 March to 8 June 2020.  This funding was used to provide the additional support as set out below:

Reimbursement of bus operators for lost on-bus revenue on tendered bus services - £55,236.39. 

A further £4,190.18 was spent on providing additional tendered services on the four Bank Holidays during the period to ensure that key workers were able to get to work during the initial Lockdown.

Finally, £1,788.25 was spent on updating passenger information on our bus shelters.

The balance of the funding was returned to the DfT.

Local Transport Authority Covid Bus Service Support Grant Restart (LTA CBSSG Restart)

Following the initial Tranche of LTA CBSSG referred to above, the DfT have allocated a further six Tranches of funding to Local Transport Authorities through the LTA CBSSG Restart package of funding, again to help cover the additional costs on the tendered bus service network resulting from Covid 19.  Each Tranche of funding has covered an 8-week operating period, and the table below sets out how this funding has been allocated and spent.

Tranche/Period Covered	Sum Awarded	Reason for Spend	Amount Spent	Balance Value Returned
Tranche 1 – 9 June 2020 to 3 August 2020	£62,114	- To cover losses where an operator takes the revenue risk on a tendered service - To cover losses where an LTA, or a lower tier authority, takes the revenue risk on a tendered service	£32,871.63     £16,498.08	£12,744.29 – not returned but deducted from Tranche 2 allocation
Tranche 2 – 4 August 2020 to 28 September 2020	£51,970 (after balance from Tranche 1 deducted)	- To cover losses where an operator takes the revenue risk on a tendered service   - To cover losses where an LTA, or a lower tier authority, takes the revenue risk on a tendered service	£18,891.41         £21,791.15	£11,287.44 – not returned but deducted from Tranche 4 allocation
Tranche 3 – 29 September 2020 to 23 November 2020	£74,405	- To cover losses where an operator takes the revenue risk on a tendered service   - To cover losses where an LTA, or a lower tier authority, takes the revenue risk on a tendered service	£22,167.11         £35,125.86	£17,112.03 – not returned but deducted from Tranche 4 allocation
Tranche 4 – 24 November 2020 to 18 January 2021	£19,260 (takes account of underspend in Tranches 2 and 3)	- To cover losses where an operator takes the revenue risk on a tendered service   - To cover losses where an LTA, or a lower tier authority, takes the revenue risk on a tendered service	£24,055.73         £22,195.51	£1,408.23 – not returned but deducted from Tranche 5 allocation
Tranche 5 – 19 January 2021 to 15 March 2021	£26,939.85	- To cover losses where an operator takes the revenue risk on a tendered service - To support community transport services that cannot claim CBSSG Restart funding	£24,639.08       £3,709.00	£0
Tranche 6 – 16 March 2021 to 10 May 2021	£21,810.15	- To cover losses where an operator takes the revenue risk on a tendered service - To support community transport services that cannot claim CBSSG Restart funding	£17,916.15       £3,894.00	£0

Two further Tranches of funding are expected covering the periods from 11 May to 5 July 2021 and 6 July to 31 August 2021. 

Full details setting out how this funding has been spent will be available upon receipt of claims from Plymouth’s bus and community transport operators.