I've recently booked a Greyhound trip (see Why is a change of carrier on Greyhound no transfer?)
I will be traveling from New York City to Toronto, which has a transfer in Buffalo. For the first leg, however, I received two separate tickets. One NYC to Syracuse, and one Syracuse to Buffalo. The scheduled number is however the same. Why did I receive three tickets in total, and not two?
It actually is odd that the carrier chose to do this but it's quite simple though not very well explained on the Greyhound Website.
When you look at New York Trailways(Purchase Tickets) site it becomes clear. Instead of one connection in Buffalo, you actually have 2 in Syracuse and Buffalo even though the bus schedule number/route number doesn't change in Syracuse.
I used to have a similar situation with a different New York bus company (Short Line / Coach USA). I would travel from Ithaca to New York City. Some trips had a transfer in Binghamton and some did not; however, I was always issued two tickets: one from Ithaca to Binghamton and another from Binghamton to NYC.
The reason in that case was that the tickets were not actually attached to a particular departure; they were valid on any bus between those points during a certain time period (I think 30 days). So even if I was planning to take a bus that ran express and did not even stop in Binghamton, I was issued two tickets in case I decided instead to take a different bus that needed a transfer.
