When will buses stick to their schedule?

Get a verifiable record that you are at the bus stop and the bus has not turned up at the scheduled time. Local bus services are registered with the Traffic Commissioner and in return for committing to run to a timetable, not more than 1 minute early or 5 minutes late, the bus operator gets a Bus Service Operators Grant (what was called Fuel Duty Rebate) to offset against the cost of fuel. Traffic Commissioners generally take a dim view of bus operators who consistently fail to run the services they have registered and do sometimes have resources to monitor this themselves, but they will also respond to representations from the public.

You now also have the option of writing to Passenger Focus, as their remit has been extended from rail to bus services. In both cases the accepted course of action is to raise the issue with the bus operator (name and address will be in 1 inch letters on the left side of the bus - a legal requirement) and if they do not give you a satisfactory answer, or continue to fail in delivering the service you take up the complaint with the Traffic Commissioner/Passenger Focus