We boarded 11.30 am service 201 from Heathrow Central bus station to Swansea on Monday 3rd March. Out of 3 large cases, one was completely ripped during the journey and beyond use. Unfortunately, we didn't see the damage when we got off the coach at Sarn ( Bridgend) at 3.30pm. Only realised when we loaded to taxi and coach had left. During the journey, we could hear cases moving in under carriage continuously! National express say they are not responsible for the luggage in undercarriage when their driver loads it and takes it out at destination!!! If they can't make the luggage safe and properly immovable in undercarriage in the 21st century, then there is something to say about it. There was a stop at Cardiff gate services before going into Sophia gdns Cardiff which is totally unnecessary as two young passengers got off without any luggage ( not even hand bags) and this is supposed to be airport service! This stop adds another 30 minutes to the journey. I advise passengers taking picture of their cases before loading and after unloading.

National Express take care of their coaches, however, when it comes to their coach stations, they really lack in maintenance and keeping up with the modern era. A good example of this is Manchester Chorlton Coach Station. While the station offers a sheltered area, there is little to be desired in this facility. Need the toilets? That is 30p... Want to charge your phone? Well, that will cost £1.50 per hour and use the slowest charging boxes around. Vending machines? Yes, they are available, but extortionate. You could make the argument that you don't need to travel there for a few hours before your coach... But if you are on a transfer and have no idea about the city you are in, then it can be scary wandering out into the city centre and getting lost potentially missing your coach. Security is non-existent, even with security alerts blaring every 10 minutes even when you are trying to sleep or get some rest before the coach arrives. National Express needs to improve on their coach stations, as Manchester isn't the only one like this. In a time when mobile phones and e-tickets are a common sight, coach stations should be required to provide USB charging or plug sockets available to those travelling both at the coach station and on the coaches (which they do on the coach). If I am travelling and have a 3-hour+ transfer and the only entertainment and communication method I have is my phone, of course, I am going to be using it. I shouldn't have to pay £1.50 for something so basic, so affordable that even other public transport methods such as National Rail offer it as standard at a majority of their rail stations. This is the same with using the toilets at the coach stations. Toilets are a mandatory thing. If someone has problems and needs the toilet, they should not be forced to pay 30p which they might not even have with them. What makes this worse is the state of the toilets and the lack of card-operated gates. Not everyone carries cash on them anymore, and the only thing they may have is a credit card. Again, toilets are free to use in train stations, so why not your coach stations? The overall quality of the coach ride was fairly rough but tolerable. The window shaking did get annoying when going over bumps during the ride, but the driver was extremely friendly, and the USB ports were working on my trip from Manchester to Glasgow. It was a pleasant ride and I would ride National Express again, if the coach stations were to be improved. Feedback to National Express: Please work on updating and modernising your privately operated coach stations. They have fallen into disrepair and offer very little in terms of passenger comfort and quality of life. Scrap the fee for the toilets or at least make it possible to pay with a card and contactless, and replace the seats with USB outlets in the armrests to make sure passengers have enough battery power for their trip and to show their tickets.

Yesss National Express you made a Bus traveller out of me! Ive had such a great experience using National Express for my transfer from Sunderland to Manchester airport and back again. The lady i dealt with via email with a query was excellent from the start and helped me with what i needed. The drivers were brilliant, friendly and super on the ball with scheduling. After a long flight home today we hoped on the 11.10 from Manchester airport and got home in great time, just what we needed!! Value wise - brilliant, i mean brilliant! None of the stress of cost of driving/parking just sit back and its all taken care of. We have always used the train service for such holidays but they are so unreliable now and expensive, also on the train you worry where your luggage could be; not with Nat Exp, all safe as houses stored and looked after on board. Highly recommend. If i had to pinpoint a specific thing that would encourage me to use Nat Exp again it’s the reliability and ease of it all. As a nervous traveller its good to know theres no hassle flexibility if you need to change anything and the busses are going to be there when you need them. Bravo 🙌🏻

Incident in the London Heathrow to Southampton Bus on 21.00 from Heathrow Terminal 2 on 21-02-2025. After an 11-hour long flight, I got onto the 205 bus that headed towards Southampton. Driver asked me to luggage my 2 Liters of Duty-free Liqour I had as my hand luggage. Once I got down from Southampton there was a big rush as passengers from another broken NE got into our bus. Due to the rush as well as tiredness, I forgot to collect the 2 clear bags each containing one tequila bottle with the receipt in it. I trusted the NE and did just a web inquiry and waited. They did find out the driver handed it back to the lost property department but bottles went missing after that. I was compensated with 50£ which is almost the market price for the bottles. @*****Please please if you take in any liqueur bottles put it inside your lauggae no matter how hazel it's or hurry you are in. *****

Great drivers, very helpful followed safety regulations, good prices and choice of locations BUT being a disabled passenger I have requirements when travelling, yes I could email the department needed but speed Is of the essence with seat allocation etc so to ensure all is correctly in place I call to make sure my needs are lined up, that call cost me £13.00! Plus an additional fee for booking over the phone, it's outrageous! I've used the email approach previously but this time and the last time I travelled I didn't receive a reply, also the last time we travelled our coach allocation was changed, I was emailed about this but the details of what I needed weren't carried over which caused issues with boarding

We took a bus from Heathrow to Cambridge and the service was fine. The bus was clean, the ride was mostly on time and there were no issues. Notably, there was a storm that day, so a lot of flights into Heathrow that day were canceled. Our flight went, but it got in late. We were literally minutes away from our bus departure time and still waiting for baggage. Once we saw the baggage, my son sprinted to the bus stop to let the driver know we were there and I followed up with the trolley and luggage since I moved slower. We probably made the bus all of 2 minutes late, but we greatly appreciated the driver waiting for us, as it made a big difference between arriving at our hotel around 10pm versus midnight. Made our trip a lot better.

I am writing about a return journey. The journey there was faultless. The bus was ontime, it was a new bus with comfy seats and WiFi and charging points. I can fault nothing.We arrived ontime too! I refuse to pay 30pence though at the bus station to use the loos. I also feel that for a major city the bus station in Newcastle is a disgrace. Please open the office up again...My return journey was an older bus with no charge points, smaller seats and no WiFi. We were 3 hours late because of traffic and a miscommunication with the driver...a 6 hour journey ended up being 9 hours. However I have no complaints because this journey cost £13 so you take the rough with the smooth. The only bugbear I have is the appauling bus station in Newcastle but I can't fault National express for value for money.

Just on The A6 service from Finchley Road to Stansted Airport. In general the service is very good and I've used it alot over the years. My one bugbear is the drivers. At the stop at Finchley Road the buses stop heading to the North of England and beyond and the drivers all seem to be very helpful, smiling and generally have good customer service. Wow, the difference when the airport buses arrive is unreal. These drivers must have been recruited by a completely different set of criteria. It's all snarling, pointing, hand gestures and woe and behold you ask a question. I always purchase my ticket in advance for a particular timed bus, on a previous occasion I showed my ticket on my phone to the driver at the kerb for my return journey to the airport, he walked away dismissing it with a cursory wrong ticket, I had to chase him along the road to show that he was looking at the time for my outward leg and that I was on the right bus. I just got another dismissive wave of the hand and a 'get on' gesture. No apology, nothing. I think National Express should invest a little time on customer service training, a little politeness doesn't hurt.

I have travelled a lot with National Express Coaches and always been happy but I travelled from Leicester to Lincoln and the air conditioning was so cold and people were complaining and I was poorly the next day. I wrote a complaint to National Express had an automated text with a reference number and after 3 text messages from myself I did another complaint about my first coplaint with another reference number that was 24th July 2024 and I still have had no reply to my first complaint on 26th June 2024. The last message I gave them my phone number to phone me but nothing from them. They stated 9 working days to reply but still nothing from them. I will not phone as the cost of a phone call is too expensive and being a pensioner I cannot afford to phone numbers that begin with 0371. I am very disappointed with the customer service from National Express.

Really comfy trip from Norwich back to Trumpington Cambridge. Good safe drivers smooth journey so very relaxing Fares are very good for a trip over 2 hours. Wouldn’t want to do it every week but makes a change from driving!