Most people charter a bus once or twice in their life, usually under pressure. A wedding is eight weeks out and nobody has figured out how the guests get from the hotel to the venue. A conference lands 200 delegates in Calgary and somebody has to move them. A team makes playoffs and needs to be in Lethbridge by Friday.
If that is you, you are probably about to email four companies, wait, and try to compare four answers that are not written the same way. Here is how charter pricing actually works, what to have ready before you ask, and how booking with us goes from first enquiry to the driver pulling up.
Who charters a bus in Calgary
Almost everyone, once you look at it. In a typical month we move:
- Weddings. Guests between hotel, ceremony, reception and back. The single most common charter we run, and the one people leave the latest.
- Corporate and conference groups. Airport transfers, hotel to venue shuttles, offsites, staff appreciation days, site visits.
- Sports teams and schools. Away games, tournaments, field trips, band and choir travel.
- Community and seniors groups. Casino trips, church outings, day trips to the mountains or the Badlands.
- Film and industrial crews. Crew transport and shift changes to sites outside the city.
- Tour groups on their own coach who just need a step on guide who knows the ground.
Different reasons, same underlying question: how much, and can you actually do my date.
What actually determines the price
Charter pricing is not a mystery, but it is not a simple per kilometre number either. These are the levers:
- Vehicle size. Our fleet runs from 7 seater luxury vehicles up to 54 seater coaches. Bigger vehicle, higher rate, but usually a lower cost per person. Two 24 seaters is often more expensive than one 54 seater.
- Time, not just distance. A charter is priced on how long the vehicle and driver are committed, not only how far they travel. A bus that drives 40 minutes and then waits five hours at a venue is working for six hours.
- Driver hours. Commercial drivers are governed by hours of service rules that cap how long they can drive and remain on duty in a day. A 14 hour wedding day may legally require two drivers. This is the single most common thing that surprises people, and it is not negotiable.
- Where the trip starts and ends. Getting the vehicle to your pickup and back to the yard afterward is real time on the clock, especially for trips well outside the city.
- Overnight trips. Multi day charters add driver accommodation and meals.
- Season and date. Peak summer, Stampede week, long weekends and wedding Saturdays are the busiest dates in Alberta. Availability tightens and it tightens early.
- Extras that are not ours. Park passes, venue parking, attraction admissions and ferry crossings are usually billed through, not absorbed.
- GST. Five percent in Alberta. If a quote you are comparing does not say whether tax is in or out, ask, because that is a five percent swing on a four figure number.
What to have ready before you ask for a quote
You will get a faster and more accurate number if you can answer these six things. If you cannot answer all of them yet, ask anyway and give us your best guess, but these are what move a quote from a rough range to a firm price.
- Date. Firm if possible. If you are choosing between two dates, tell us both and we will tell you which one has better availability.
- Passenger count. Your honest number, not your optimistic number. Vehicle size is the biggest price lever there is, and a count that grows by eight people the week before is the most expensive kind of change.
- Pickup and drop off addresses. Actual addresses, not “downtown.”
- Start time and end time. Including how long the bus waits between legs.
- Whether it is one trip or a shuttle loop. Running continuous loops between a hotel and a venue is priced very differently from one trip out and one trip back.
- Anything unusual. Luggage, ski or hockey gear, mobility aids, wheelchair access, a wedding party that needs the bus to look good in photos.
How booking with us actually works
This is the part most people find genuinely different from what they expected.
1. You request a quote online. Our quote request form asks for the six things above. It takes about two minutes.
2. We quote against real availability. This is the important bit. Our quotes are built off our live fleet calendar, so when we tell you a 54 seater is available on your date, that vehicle is genuinely open, not “probably open, let me check with dispatch.” No holding pattern while somebody flips through a paper book, and no quote that gets retracted two days later because the coach was already committed.
3. You get a written quote with the price broken out. Vehicle, hours, GST, deposit and total. Not a number in the body of an email that you have to take on faith.
4. You accept and pay online. Card payment through a secure checkout, with the deposit and balance terms stated up front. You get a confirmation immediately. Nothing is held on a promise.
5. We lock the vehicle. Once your booking is confirmed, that specific vehicle is committed to you for that window and cannot be sold to anyone else. Our whole operation, charters, shuttles and day tours, runs on one system so there is no version of your bus quietly getting double booked against a tour departure.
6. You get your details before the day. Confirmed itinerary, pickup times, and driver contact information ahead of the trip, so on the morning of your event you are texting a name rather than phoning an office.
The software behind that is GridOps, a Calgary built platform for bus operators. You will not think about it once. That is the point. It is why you get a real answer the same day instead of a callback on Thursday.
Deposits, changes and cancellations
Group plans change. Guest counts move, ceremonies run long, flights are late. What matters is knowing the rules before you need them, not after.
- Deposit. A deposit confirms the booking and takes the vehicle off the board. Terms are stated on your quote before you accept, not buried afterward.
- Changes. Timing adjustments and added stops are usually workable with reasonable notice. Changes on the day may add hours to the charge, because they add hours to the driver’s day.
- Cancellations. Our cancellation terms are on your quote. Read them at the point you book, when you still have options, rather than the week you need them.
- Passenger count changes. Going down is easy. Going up may mean a different vehicle, and on a busy Saturday a different vehicle may not exist. Book on your realistic number.
What is included and what is not
Included: a professional, licensed driver, fuel, insurance, and a vehicle that has passed its inspections. On our tour products, a guide.
Usually extra: attraction admissions, park passes, venue or event parking, ferry fees, driver accommodation on overnight trips, and gratuity. Gratuity is not automatic and is entirely at your discretion, but drivers who spend a fourteen hour day getting a wedding to run on time tend to have earned one.
Five mistakes people make booking group transport
- Booking too late. Peak Saturdays in Calgary go months out. The vehicle you want in July is spoken for in March.
- Underestimating the passenger count. Eight extra people at the last minute is the most expensive change there is.
- Forgetting the wait time. A bus that sits at a venue for five hours is on the clock for five hours.
- Comparing quotes that are not comparable. One with GST in, one without. One with two drivers, one that has not accounted for hours of service. Get every quote broken out and compare the same lines.
- Assuming a verbal hold is a booking. Until there is a deposit and a written confirmation, nothing is reserved. Anywhere.
Our fleet
We run from 7 seater luxury vehicles to 54 seater highway coaches, serving Calgary and Western Canada. Same fleet handles airport transfers, wedding shuttles, corporate charters, sports and school travel, and day tours to Banff and Drumheller. You can see the range on our equipment page.
Get a number
Two minutes, six answers, and a real price against real availability.
Prefer to talk it through? Email charters@rtbtours.ca and we will work it out with you.
Online quoting and booking for RTB Tours & Shuttles is powered by GridOps.