3,000 Expected to Lose Jobs at Greyhound

PHOENIX — About 3,000 employees will lose their jobs as Greyhound Corp. turns over 96 bus stations to independent operators who will receive a percentage of terminal business, company officials announced Monday.

Severance pay and other expenses related to the move will cost Greyhound about $15 million, to be taken out of Greyhound’s second-quarter after-tax earnings, John W. Teets, Greyhound chairman and chief executive, said in a statement.

The layoffs will save the nation’s largest bus carrier money in the long run, company officials said.

Greyhound should start saving considerable overhead expenses once the terminals are converted to commission agents because the company will no longer be paying employees there, company spokesman Don Behnke said. He said he didn’t know how much Greyhound officials hope to save, and he didn’t know when the layoffs would be completed.

Unions Consent

Unions representing Greyhound workers agreed to the move, Greyhound said.

Union officials could not immediately be reached for comment.

Greyhound officials hope most of the workers who lost their jobs will find employment with new operators of the terminals, Behnke said.

Asked who would run the terminals, Behnke said: “In many cases, they are former employees who have decided to become commission agencies under the situation.”

Greyhound has been involved in a massive scaling down of its bus lines, which it says have been crippled in recent years by cheap airline fares. Under a move announced last August, Greyhound said it was cutting its management ranks by about one-third.