How CoachRail Improved our Charter Bus Business with Modern Reservation Technology

As our business continues to grow, we at GOGO Charters make it a priority to find new and improved ways to fulfill customer needs and ensure that our team can work as efficiently as possible. After a few years of using our old reservation software, we found that it was becoming more difficult to keep up with our growing business and the ever-changing world of technology.

The in-house software we had been using to send quotes and fulfill trips had become dated, slow, and convoluted, and searching our database for information on customers and on reservations was a chore. We knew it was time for a change, so we started looking for new software that could accommodate our business and that wouldn’t be a hassle to integrate. After asking around, one of our affiliates suggested we try CoachRail.

CoachRail’s platform proved to be intuitive and easy for our team members to use and, as a bonus, came with a nice modern look which made for a more pleasant user experience on our end. Being able to send quotes, book trips, and process payments all from one platform made our sales process far more efficient than before. All of these elements came together to boost our team’s productivity and provide a more positive experience for our customers which, of course, was our primary concern.

Integrating the software was simple. As with any new software, it’s important to note that we had to get over a few inevitable learning curves before we fully understood it, but we found this process to be speedy. Our team members familiarized themselves with the interface to learn where to find customer information and fleet availability before using the software to book trips. While getting used to any new workflow can be a challenge, we found CoachRail’s interface to be intuitive and easy to learn.

Michael at CoachRail’s customer support was friendly and willing to perform live demonstrations, so we separated our team members into groups and made sure that everyone was able to watch a demo before diving into the platform. After less than a week, our team was navigating the software like pros.

After booking, a customer’s information is securely stored in our company’s personal CoachRail database. Here, our sales team can easily access customers’ phone numbers, email addresses, and trip details with just a few clicks. Should any adjustments need to be made to a customer’s trip, one of our team members can quickly access the best way to contact the customer to ensure that the change is processed efficiently; before, customer information was often lost in email chains or difficult to find due to laggy software.

Having our team members keep up with their trips in CoachRail also provides more opportunities to improve our sales process and keep up with our team members’ progress. Our managers use CoachRail to study closing ratios, number of quotes sent, and other key performance indicators. From here, we can better train our staff based on data we’ve found in their KPIs and tailor new training sessions accordingly. This has lead to happier team members and, therefore, happier customers.

Finally, keeping up with our affiliated providers has become much easier within CoachRail’s system. CoachRail lets you add private notes on each bus provider you’ve worked with, and you can rank them with a “thumbs up” and “thumbs down” so you can decide which provider to work with when you need to reach out for more buses. We also took into consideration our customers’ experiences with affiliates and scored each affiliate accordingly.

All-in-all, we would recommend CoachRail as a worthy investment for bus companies who are either frustrated with their current software or looking to upgrade to something more modern. We believe that keeping up with the newest software is crucial to staying relevant in any business field, and motorcoach operation is no exception. Although upgrading can be intimidating, the ease of use is well worth the time spent learning the software, especially if your company still relies on pen and paper or spreadsheets to book trips.

CoachRail’s staff has also informed us that they plan to release multiple new features in the near future— something we’re excited to witness as we ourselves continue to grow.