Birthday Bus Offers

Businesses within the Bristol, South Gloucestershire and North Somerset area* have the opportunity to provide an offer that will feature on the West of England Combined Authority Birthday Bus website and promoted to users of the scheme throughout the year. 

*If you are a business within the Bath & North East Somerset region please contact Bath BID for how to get involved.

What is the birthday bus pass offer?

The scheme is the only one of its kind in the country. Residents who live in the West of England Mayoral Combined Authority and North Somerset Council areas can apply online to get free bus travel for the whole month of their birthday. Or for Under 21s, it’s two months free - the month of their birthday and the following one.

Once they've filled in an application, if everything's in order, a birthday bus pass will be made and sent to them in the post shortly before the start of the month their birthday falls in. It's valid on almost all buses across the West of England and North Somerset.

 Example of an adult pass with one-month validity and an under-21 pass with two-month validity – it won’t normally feature a dog!

 The back of the card will feature a unique code, and the logos differ slightly, dependent on who issued it. However, both should be accepted.

When are the passes valid?

Passes are only valid for the month of the recipient’s birthday, or two months for Under 21s. These are clearly shown on the front of the cards in the white box.

The birthday bus pass scheme will run for a 12-month period from 1 December 2024 until 30 November 2025 (31 December for Under 21s due to their second free month).

Please be aware: People may keep their card after the month of their birthday, but it is no longer valid. Also, the offer ran last year with a different card design – these are no longer valid.

What do we need from you?

All the offers provided will be listed at www.birthdaybus.co.uk/offers.  To create your offer on that page, we will need:

• The offer – ie free cup of coffee or 10% off
• Short added description to include any restrictions (see below) eg limited to one in your birthday month/under 18’s etc (space is limited so maximum of 30-40 words)
• Address – so we can add how to get there by bus
• Logo
• Web address to add so people can click through to your website for more details
• Social media details

Please send all information above to marketing@visitwest.co.uk

It will state on the offers page that:

• The offers are available to claim by somebody showing their valid birthday bus pass. 
• Participating businesses and the Combined Authority can withdraw offers at any time

If you need to include additional T&C’s, these will need to be hosted on your website and will be linked to.

Possible restrictions/considerations:

• Is the offer only available once to each person? Is this able to be tracked?
• If you have a web presence, is the offer only available in-person only?
• Are there any restrictions such as time of use or amount spent?

Would you like to help promote the offer?

The West of England Mayor Dan Norris, West of England Mayoral Combined Authority and North Somerset Council will be heavily marketing the Birthday Bus pass offer across the region, including the discounts and freebies of additional offers. They would also like to promote some of the individual offers where possible – this could be directly to people who have signed up via email, on social media or potentially via press release.

If you are interested in helping to get the word out and would like to do some joint social media activity or collab posts. Please let us know on marketing@visitwest.co.uk if you are interested in joint activity.

We will be producing some supporting marketing materials – for example posters and leaflets  -  that you can use. We’d love you to display these, but please use these at your discretion. We will send some when you sign up and more will be available if needed.

How many people are expected to claim a free birthday bus pass?

Last year one-month free bus travel for everyone was offered, with no extra freebies or discounts, and no extra month for under 21s. Over 72,000 people signed up, so, with this year’s fantastic additions they are expecting it to be more.

Thank you again for taking part. It’s fantastic for residents of our area, and iwe really hope that it will help drive some additional customers to your business. For any further information, head to birthdaybus.co.uk, or reach out at marketing@visitwest.co.uk.

Don’t forget to apply for your own FREE Birthday Bus travel and tell your family and friends!