OC Transpo began using Twitter in 2010; it has since gained close to 82,000 followers and shared
almost 400,000 updates across three accounts. In that time, social media has significantly
evolved, as have customer expectations.
As part of OC Transpo’s commitment to implementing industry best practices, increasing
responsiveness to customer inquiries, improving overall communications, and building public trust,
OC Transpo is relaunching its Twitter accounts.
Starting May 1st, “OC_TranspoHelps” and “OC_TranspoAide” replaced the “OCTranspoLive”
and “OCTranspoDirect” accounts. These new customer service-focused Twitter accounts are
managed by customer service representatives who are empowered to quickly respond to
customer inquiries and provide support.
Detours, major disruptions, and other important service alerts will continue to be shared on these
accounts. This complements OC Transpo’s organizational account, “OC_Transpo”, which provides
system-wide updates and general information for customers, such as links to the Next Stop Blog
posts.
While some customers may have used the previous Twitter accounts to find changes to their
specific bus trips, this is no longer possible. Twitter has introduced new pricing to access certain
features of their platform, which would add a cost of approximately $675,600 per year to continue
to post specific trip information.
This update to OC Transpo’s Twitter presence is also a component of a plan to improve
communications with customers; further enhancements can be expected. These improvements
will complement ongoing work to upgrade real-time data information for customers. Additional
information on the real-time data project will be provided at the May 11 Transit Commission
meeting.
Customers can continue to find specific bus trip information, like bus departure times, by:
• Visiting octranspo.com and using the next departures widget on the homepage
• Signing up for MyAlerts
• By texting 560560
• Using the Travel Planner.
