INTERCAPE---UNSAFE---UNRELAIBLE --NO EMPATHY

On the 24/09/2024, I travelled with " Intercape" from DBN to JHB. My woes started at Durban station when I realised that i paid for a Intercape " Mainliner" and the bus that i am about to board is a "Sky Bus" .I questioned the staff at the counter and they said it operated by Intercape...I told them that this is false advertising as I paid for a reliable Intercape bus which is not this Sky bus and i paid R700.00 and if i wanted to book a Skybus i would have selected that bus instead of Intercape ....Anyway they didn’t user stand me and they was rude with no customer service and didn’t want to refund my ticket as I was not happy with this SKY BUS as i booked Intercape Mainliner. I was forced to take the Sky bus as now i am out of pocket by R700.00 as they refused my refund and i would have taken the refund and bought a Greyhound ticket instead. Anyway it starts to get worse, we left Durban station at 11:00am and the arrival time at JHb is around 19:05..At 14:21 the bus pulled over on the side of road on the N3 next to the Mooi-river offramp. We were then informed by the driver that the bus in overheating and we have to wait for a another bus that will be sent from Durban. While waiting for the bus and upon further investigation , it was established by the 2 drivers that the protocol is that when the drivers enter the bus depot to fetch the bus, they conduct a routine check of the bus, however the bus was being test driven by the mechanic and the mechanic told them the bus is fine and the drivers don’t have to do the routine check and can leave with the bus. The drivers and we were now questioning why the bus was being repaired by the mechanic ???just before the trip ???and what went wrong??? and clearly the bus was defective?? from the beginning as there was a problem with this unreliable bus??. The drivers were not informed by the mechanic or given a report of what repairs was done ???before handing over the bus to the drivers. The exchange bus was also another “SKY bus” that arrived about 15: 35. We left Mooi river just before 16:00, about 20 mins into the trip , the the toilet on board the bus was not working. The drivers had to make repeated stops continuously on the road just for people to relive them selves and we took nearly another 12 hours on the road by arriving at Park station in JHB around 21:40.

Intercape put our lives at risk and didn’t care about our safety with a defective bus, they then sent another bus whereby the toilets didn’t work, and this was a very unbearable, uncomfortable trip ever and I paid a lot of money travel in luxury. Can someone who can understand us as customers contact me urgently as I know now that Intercape only thrives on profits only and don’t care about the customer experience and I will complain on all social platforms, until I am heard.!!!!