In partnership on the road

PostBus has always worked with PostBus operators, private transport companies of various sizes. They provide more than half of PostBus services: reliably and flexibly.

They repair vehicles, maintain garages, recruit staff and carry out administrative work independently – PostBus operators run their business on their own account. They create jobs in peripheral regions and remote villages, promoting trade both directly and indirectly. These private businesses, often family-run, are able to make efficient seasonal use of their driver and vehicle capacities – and are also very agile in other respects.

The best example of flexibility is Maura Marchetti, PostBus operator and driver in Airolo. When asked by PostBus management if she would like to work on a project at headquarters in Berne, she quickly decided to move for a year with her husband and three children to German-speaking Switzerland. Here, she was able to contribute her experience of the front line when it came to working with representatives of both sides to draw up a broad-based new agreement for cooperation between PostBus operators and PostBus.

Cooperation with a long tradition

The cooperation throughout Switzerland between PostBus and PostBus operators goes back to the time before there were cars, when horse owners carried travellers on behalf of the Swiss federal post office. The beginning of the 20th century saw the first private entrepreneurs acting as bus operators – the forerunners of the approximately 125 current PostBus operators. Today, they employ almost as many people as PostBus and provide more than 50 percent of transport services in regional passenger transport. Their size ranges from microcompanies with just one vehicle to medium-sized companies with 50 vehicles and over 100 employees.

SBB cooperation

SBB and PostBus are working more closely together: as part of a pilot project, the two partners are testing options for cooperation on online timetables and ticket shops, and are jointly developing a mobility app. They are also strengthening their coordination on self-driving vehicles and planning. The collaboration aims to benefit the public transport sector as a whole.