First Student UK

First Student UK took 8,000 students to and from school in the UK every day. Fifteen school bus systems were operated, two in Scotland, two in Wales and the rest in England. The buses were run on door-to-door services direct to and from schools, with no adult members of the public allowed to board, and were equipped with seatbelts as standard, with all schoolchildren aboard having a designated seat on a bus. By April 2006, the scheme had achieved a 50% modal shift from car to bus on school runs served by the scheme.

In contrast to the North American division, where school busing is a primary function, First Student UK takes advantage of the existence of a First Group operating depot throughout the country; some areas where First did not operate, had to have new depots opened to operate the buses. The first schemes also had buses built like traditional US school buses, whereas later schemes have more conventional European designs. First Student schemes were run on behalf of the local authority by an existing subsidiary of First or subcontracted to an independent operator where they do not have a presence.

In one of the biggest First Student schemes, First West Yorkshire was the largest provider of yellow school buses on behalf of West Yorkshire Metro, running 81 school buses every day on Metro's My Bus scheme in Halifax. These services were operated using a fleet of BMC Condor buses. First Berkshire, meanwhile, launched a small scheme in Runnymede in February 2002, Another scheme was run on behalf of Hampshire County Council, with handful of buses operated to selected schools by First Hampshire & Dorset, and a bus was also demonstrated in the Greater Manchester area during September 2000 by First Manchester.

Ride Pegasus!

'Ride Pegasus!' was a school bus scheme run by First Berkshire & The Thames Valley under contract to Surrey Country Council. The scheme, which required 22 buses, served 14 primary schools in the Guildford area and carried 850 children each day for a cost of £900,000 per year. Some non-school "Access Bus" services, primarily for senior citizens, were also run, as was the Guildford park & ride route 300 to Merrow. Buses were run from the council depot in Merrow Lane, which was treated as an outstation to one of First Berkshire's main depots. Ride Pegasus stopped running on 23 July 2010, at the end of the 2010 school year, due to the withdrawal of financing by the council.