The Bus Times skill gives you real-time departure for your local bus stop(s) anywhere in the UK. Once Alexa knows your local bus stops (see below), you just have to say:
--- 'Alexa, open Bus Times' or 'Alexa, ask Bus Times for my next bus' or 'Alexa, ask Bus Times for bus stop 2'
to get the times and destinations of the next two buses departing from each bus stop. If a bus is running late, Alexa will tell you by how many minutes and the expected departure time.
** Important note **
The Bus Times skill requires access to read and write the Bus Times list. Please give the permissions in the Alexa app by going to Skills > Your Skills > Bus Times > Settings > Manage Settings and allow both read and write access.
** Initial one-time set-up **
You should enter your local bus stop identifiers (see below) in the Bus Times list (this is a custom list in the Alexa app). The first time you say 'Alexa, open Bus Times' the Bus Times list will be created for you.
Once your Bus Times list is ready, you'll need to add the identifier codes for your local bus stop(s). These are the codes that allow Alexa to find out the real-time departure information.
Each bus stop has a unique identifier / code which is normally between 8 and 12 characters and can be a mix of numbers and letters. You can find your local bus stop codes from http://findthestop.co.uk. In this website, enter the city or town where you live and you'll be presented with a map and a list of bus stops. Find the bus stops which are nearest to where you live and click on the bus stop name to get the code.
For example, here is a bus stop in Southend and the bus stop code is 15800506:
http://findthestop.co.uk/stops/view/88176
You may have two local bus stops - on opposite sides of the road for buses going in different directions. You can add each bus stop identifier to the Bus Times list and these will be used by Alexa to get your bus times information. So in this case your Bus Times list might be:
15800506 15800538
**Please note**
If Bus Times can't find the next bus departures for a bus stop, it will say 'There are no buses departing for the rest of today'. This could be for two reasons: either the last bus of the day has already left or the bus stop identifier isn't recognised. If you get this message in the morning, then it's likely to be a bad bus stop identifier. Please check your bus stop identifier from the physical bus stop and then update the Bus Times list with the correct identifier.
** Acknowledgement **
Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v1.0.
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