The purpose of this qualification is to provide the road passenger service industry with qualified people who can transport passengers safely, communicate effectively, provide customer service and be considerate and responsible road users.

Learners will benefit by having a qualification that recognises their skills and knowledge in the road passenger service industry, supports job performance, and enhances employment opportunities.

The road passenger service industry will benefit in efficiency by having staff with recognised skills and knowledge to competently and consistently drive road passenger service vehicles and maintain personal and customer safety in the passenger service environment.

This qualification is targeted at people working or planning to work in the passenger service industry who hold a current licence of the appropriate class for the vehicle being used and a current passenger (P) endorsement seeking to be recognised as senior drivers.

The strands allow for selection to meet the needs of people working in each of those contexts - school bus, urban bus and long distance bus.

Due to the nature of the role, graduates will generally operate without supervision, but will be operating within a defined set of organisational boundaries.

Graduates of this qualification will be able to:

- Maintain personal and customer safety in the passenger service environment, including hazard identification and mitigation, incident and passenger management
- Comply with organisational policies and procedures, regulatory requirements, and other current road traffic laws in the environment within which the driver is operating
- Prepare a passenger service vehicle for use and drive scheduled routes in a fuel efficient manner
- Communicate professionally with passengers and respond to a variety of passenger needs and requests

Graduates of the School Bus strand will also be able to:
- Comply with the terms of the Ministry of Education's Contract for the provision of School Transport Assistance (STA)
- Assist and manage passengers and apply incident management actions in accordance with school and organisational requirements

Graduates of the Urban Bus strand will also be able to:
- Assist and manage passengers, and manage the running of a scheduled service according to legal and organisational requirements
- Apply knowledge of fare and zone structures, and manage equipment and facilities for collection of fares

Graduates of the Long Distance Bus strand will also be able to:
- Apply knowldege of terms of carriage, passenger responsibilities and driver responsibilities on a long distance bus journey, including dealing responsibly with passengers' luggage
- Meet coach passenger needs throughout a long distance bus journey to provide a safe, reliable and comfortable service

This is a stand-alone qualification covering the skills and knowledge required for driving road passenger service vehicles in specific passenger service environments.

Graduates may choose to undertake higher level qualifications relevant to their industry such as other driving qualifications or generic management qualifications such as New Zealand Certificate in Business (First Line Management) (Level 4) [Ref: 2456].

People entering into programmes leading to this qualification must hold:

- A current licence of the appropriate class for the vehicle being used.
- A current passenger (P) endorsement.