surcharge on bus fares

on 31 july when the petrol/diesel hike was announced, many blog on it. as i mentioned in adam’s blog, i did not blog about it as i’m beyond grumbling. 🙂 at the last hike on 1 may, i had blog about it. and prior to that, in early april, even before the petrol hike was announced on 1 may, taxi and bus had already announced their price hike… and then come in too.. the penang ferry fare was increased!

but now i’m blogging on it because of what bus operators wants to impose fuel surcharge on us. 10 cents per ticket for stage bus and 5% for express bus, so the pan malaysian bus operators association suggested.

what? so fast want to increase the bus fares already? and 10 cents for stage bus? it was only in may the mini bus operators increased their fare of 80 cents to RM1.00. and now if the gomen approve their increase, it would be RM1.10. actually during may they should not increase. why during may, they did not seek the gomen’s approval?

the service of penang’s mini bus is terrible… the RM1.00 is not worth it. well i wouldn’t really say the service as to the schedule (but it is bad too) but rather the condition of the bus. old and worn out bus. some buses, dripped water from the exposed pipe! some with dark black smokes coming out from the exhaust. and the worst is the air-con is more often than not 95% of the time not working. so damn hot in the buses.

so why should we pay more for it when the bus is not of standard? when we do not get air con, when we pay for air con? i don’t understand why the authority (i.e. the JPJ) didn’t do a check on the buses.

back to the call for surcharge, datuk mohamad ashfar ai pan, the malaysian bus operators association president, then said that the other alternative is that the gomen could subsidise stage bus operators for operating their routes based on the number of kilometres operated by each bus.

well, i think that is what the gomen OUGHT to do. absorb the cost, don’t let us the poor rakyat absorb it. each time there is any price hike by the gomen, it is us who have to suffer. so fed up! if the bus fare do increase, perhaps it’s time for me to learn to ride my chaly to and fro office/home, or anywhere i go (presently i’m only using it within town area). oops. but then i have to buy petrol to feed it… ayoh, how ah then?