Very good advice. However vouchers don't pay my rent for this month. I'm out the money I spent for a hotel room and other expenses that were not factored into my fixed-income budget. I'm at home playing catch-up financially due to Amtrak's negligence, and speaking loudly of this fiasco to my senior friends who were curious to know what a cross-country trip on Amtrak would be like. They're not impressed with Amtrak's lack of immediate response to me after leaving me in a strange city at night. Perhaps Amtrak is not worried about one lone traveler when they're the only passenger train going cross-country and where I came from there's plenty more seniors wiling to take their chances with Amtrak bc that's their only mode of travel as they age. Just ike me. I'm an example of the senior traveler who quits driving and still wants to travel. I'm beyond disappointed and rethinking future solo travel with Amtrak, as I wisely should.
Well, I cannot fault that reaction to your experience. I am sure I would feel similarly.
However, I would like to find out some more details on your situation, to help flesh it out and perhaps find things that you or others could do in the future to avoid getting as completely stuck as you did.
Did you originally have a ticket for a train rather than a bus? Were you notified in advance that they were substituting a bus? Were you notified in advance of a service disruption causing them to substitute a bus? Amtrak doesn't appear to offer scheduled Amtrak Thruway bus service between Jefferson City and Kansas City, there are two Amtrak trains a day and no scheduled buses. That makes me think that it was a one time "bustitution" charter. Communications between multiple companies in those situations can get crossed up. In the airline world, that would have been an IRROPS, irregular operations, situation. As anyone who has ever been caught up in IRROPS knows, that is never a good thing.
Do you recall if the "Amtrak employee" you spoke to at Jefferson City that told you to wait for a second bus was in Amtrak uniform and wore an Amtrak ID on a lanyard? Amtrak employees are required to be in uniform when on duty. Did they get off the bus and were directing people, or did they come out of the station? I ask because Jefferson City is an unstaffed station so normally no Amtrak staff is posted there. If that person was at the station, I strongly suspect that person was a station "caretaker". Those are
never Amtrak employees and are often volunteers or employed by the local cities to unlock and lock up the station. Caretakers usually do not have much information beyond train times and delays, and cannot speak for Amtrak. If a caretaker was directing you not to board a bus or preventing you from speaking with the driver, they were exceeding their authority (which is precisely zero) and perhaps suffering some kind of "little tin god" complex.
I think you were correct in thinking you should have at least spoken with the driver, who at least would have been employed by the chartered bus company and stood the best chance of actually knowing. The fact that a person that was likely just a station caretaker actively stopped you from talking to the bus driver to get accurate information I find reprehensible.
It sounds like the perfect storm, a service interruption, a one-off bustitution, and a possible caretaker overstepping both his knowledge and authority.
I know for myself, and a lot of us here, when we get into a service interruption situation, it is time to get very proactive in self-defense. Amtrak is inconsistent and internal communications are not the best even on good days.
You obeyed the instructions you were given by people whom you thought knew what was going on and represented Amtrak. You had no way of knowing at the time they didn't know and probably didn't represent Amtrak. But your experience can be a lesson to others in how much they need to act proactively in the moment and ensure that they are being given the best possible information. In your case, that you were being instructed by someone who likely was a non-Amtrak caretaker and might have known little, if anything, more than you did. Also, if you were traveling on a weekday, the departures from Jefferson City take place during the hours Customer Relations is staffed and you could have gotten them on the case in real time. That might have resulted in a better outcome than vouchers (might have authorized a very expensive taxi/Uber to KC. Stranger things have happened).
Even though your troubles likely were not at the hands of Amtrak staff, they sold you the ticket and ultimately were responsible. Unfortunately, even if you continue to follow up with Customer Relations, I still don't think it will result in more than an offer of more value in vouchers now.
Amtrak travel can be relaxing and enjoyable, but sometimes it can become an unholy mess. Many of us here are frequent riders and have gotten caught in some messes. I know I have, though never as bad as yours was.
