The fine is a joke…..I wonder what more funny stuff the PTC is going to come up with…..

It’s really strange a small place like Singapoe cannot seem to manage their transportation problems….

and I argee with the writer to inform on SMRT on overcrowding…perhaps a 1000(caught) x $100 would make a dent on SMRT to wake up….now would PTC respond to all 1000 calls…

Yes. Even if its just 100 dollars. Make sure they allow commuters to report on them. See how much it accumulates to

PTC Chairman Gerard Ee already received his National day award last year. Why you all still want him to work so hard for what?

But ya la, $100 fine? What’s that? Not even a pinch! May as well buy them breakfast!

Instead of punishing with fines, the transport operators should be punished by serving community hours.

Money is nothing to them. But time…hey hey.

[...] 42 million dollars in just Quarter 1 of 2009 alone. a helpful netizen did some math and found out here that it only accounted for 0.00024% of profits. That was only one instance. Assuming that SMRT was [...]

then the fines amount should be 100 times or 1000x more as i am force to squeeze

where is the sense of proportion???

I agree that the proportion of fines to the company’s profits is a little, ridiculous. But to be fair, it is almost impossible to prevent overcrowding of trains during peak hours. Likewise for buses, and if the PTC fines the PT operators for every instance of overcrowding, it would accumulate into a significant amount that will greatly affect the company’s revenue and profits, which can be spent instead on more efficient public transport methods.

@Damien

The purpose of the fines is to exert pressure on the transport companies to improve their services – it is not meant to serve as a meaningless gesture to appease the masses – which the current fine is.

Either the fines must be increased to a sufficient quantum to make the transport operators feel the pain, or alternative measures must be put in place – like increased checks leading to a board of inquiry at the ministry of transport to review the licensing terms of the operators if the operators consistently fail to improve.

Also, it need not be said that the PTC, when reviewing price increases, should take into account the penalties, and question whether service standards have been upheld. The price controls will also serve to prevent the transport companies from passing the fines down to the commuters.

All the above assumes that the PTC and the transport ministry actually champion the rights of the commuters. With the government being the biggest shareholders of the transport companies, the PTC exists solely to be the rubber stamp of the transport companies.

And hence the only punitive actions we will see against miscreant transport operators will be puny, inconsequential fines that do not even translate into a slap on the wrist.

The fine is a joke. A token to appease the public that PTC is doing something. However it will do nothing to improve transport. Can we make adjustment to littering fine so that it is 0.001% of the offender salay ???

Damien,

How can you say it is impossible to prevent overcrowding? Get more trains? Use the money saved on fines to run more train trips?

8) Damien on April 7th, 2009 8.06 am

I agree that the proportion of fines to the company’s profits is a little, ridiculous. But to be fair, it is almost impossible to prevent overcrowding of trains during peak hours. Likewise for buses, and if the PTC fines the PT operators for every instance of overcrowding, it would accumulate into a significant amount that will greatly affect the company’s revenue and profits, which can be spent instead on more efficient public transport methods.

# 8)

…. it is almost impossible to prevent overcrowding of trains during peak hours…

The overcrowding may be impossible to prevent , but unless up to 25% of the passengers are loitering around the platforms, missing the next train (thereby causing bottleneck situations) they can be overcomed. (overcrowding).

Simply increase the frequency of the trains… Anything above 5 minutes (peak or non-peak) is UNACCEPTABLE.

SMRT/SBS are simply adopting an age-old concept of squeezing all in as little trips as possible to maximise profits.

Another comment. The airflow in the trains are poor. So again do we blame it on overcrowding. In countries like Hong Kong, they have audits for a minimum temperature in air conditioned areas.

Supporting the Green Environment is one thing, exploiting it to save $$$ (for juicy bottomlines) is another.

A belated April fool joke? It is like fining a rapist $100 to deter him from committing similar offence in future, I doubt the deterrent measures carried out by PTC is effective enough and was deemed equally not taking any action at all. So why go through the hassle simply for show?

normal citizen if just throw a litter will fine i think $100 or even $500.

very strange indeed.

I think we need more competition. However, what is the right number of competitors? We do not want a repeat of SPH closing down SPH MediaWorks and Swissport Singapore leaving Changi Airport.

Well as long as the people accept , they will continue to prosper.

if PTC fines them too heavily, expect us commuters to bear the brunt of their future price hikes. It’s just a dumb system.

only when the fat lady sings. whatever forum, blogs or hlp events will come to nothing. only when the fat lady sings. big bang ver 2.0 – the new beginning.

This is obviously a wayang for the suffering public. If the PTC wants to REALLY punish the companies, they should make them give free rides for 1-2 days. The savings are passed to the commuters immediately. The companies suffer the losses immediately. That’s what transport companies do in other countries.

There is no point dishing out fines.
Should implement a wage/bonus freeze/cut.

How can fine too much?

There is an old saying that goes – if you want to punish the child, first find out who’s the parent…

In this instance, it is ah kong who owns substantial stakes in both…

I am not sure if anything can be done for the trains on the NS line. They are already only 2 minutes apart iirc. The only way to increase capacity is to have coaches where the door does not open. i.e now is 6, increase to 8, where the 2 at each end do not open their doors.

For bus, there is lots to do. Simply having more buses will do wonders. If they are not at the stage where the buses are continuously appearing at each bus stop, that means there is capacity to increase.

Wow…$100 fines. That is the best PTC can come up with. What a great idea from a great team. They must have endless sleepless nights to come up with this solution. Keep up the good work PTC – you guys never fail to degrade your capabilities.

Is SBS a GLC?
Who forms the PTC?
2 questions will do.

$100 fine… ask $1000 to donate to PTC

This is simply ridiculous. $100 fine for the operator may be less than the penalty for some of the fare cheats.

If the PTC is serious about improving transport services, it should cap the profit of the operator at a reasonable level (the present practice?). A service deficiency lowers the cap but a service excellence (over and above the standard) increases the cap. The PTC must remember that the metrics drive behavior of the operator.

Now, it that so difficult?

The small fines are just to give people the impression that PTC is regulating SMRT, therefore discouraging more opposition votes. I think Singaporeans must be aware of these cheapo tactics by PTC.

What is the gov keep making a fool of itself ?
Nope … It is appropiate to say that the gov is in fact making the fool out of citizen.

They want you to be the fool to believe that the gov is serious in giving fine to their own bodies, no matter how pathetic the fine is. Remember the fine is just to prove a point, nothing else, just like the laughable fine for editors in WSJ.

Well, simple economy-blues (non)sense.
Price of oil has dropped tremendously, so the amount of penalties dropped similarly. . . ..

Come, come lets invite the PTC to write here what they have got to say about these PEANUT FINES. If I am not wrong, Mr Gerald Ee USED spoke a lot and a lot always about public transport issues.
Please Mr Ee, or whoever knows him happen to read here, please request him to comment on these ULTRA SMALL-SIZE PEANUT FINES.

This is the state we are in. The relevant authorities are making a joke out of the entire issue of improving transport standards. It is saying that the transport companies have come to such an advanced stage in it development that any shortcomings are either inevitable if not impossible, thus the tickle meted out to reflect its opinion.

Just a few thousand dollars “fine”. The “fines” are much less than the cost to a bus company for improving their service….so even an idiot CEO would not bother with what PTC say.

Well, ain’t it amazing how fast and efficient PTC will increase fare for them ,and yet when it comes to issues such as overcrowding or timeliness, it doesn’t seem to do as much…

a 100 dollars fine for such an act, while they allow commuters to be fine $20 pax for cheating on fares…what an ironic…

so it won’t be obvious to us all what is the objective of PTC. however, with this new fiasco, more people will become aware of the PTC stand. if it didn’t try to fine this companies the peanut sum, maybe we won’t say anything. however, by fining them for such a small amount, they have just open themselves up to scrutiny and criticizm

I think the Govt should lower the fine for littering to $0.05 from the current $500 to keep up with times. It will still be a deterent judging from the fine of $4k to a company with profits of $42mil.

I am guessing the PTC chairman will be the next President of Singapore..

Both PTC and SBS (and all other state-owned transport company) are under one roof, under the single same big umbrella that pay and feed them. They are like siblings or counsin to each other, and therefore why should they hurting each other? So what if the fines is 0.00024% of its revenue? They are just putting on show. Their service standard will remains because any increase in frequency will hurt their profits, which indirectly hurts our government profits too.

That’s what you get when you vote for single party government.

These transport companies are more or less guaranteed to make a good profits. If the profit is not up to their expectation the fares will be increased. And commuters are made to pay more. The government fines them and if that cuts into their profits the commuters will have to make good for the shortfall.
One way to improve service is to fine the people responsible including the CEO.

36) ysl on April 8th, 2009 4.20 pm These transport companies are more or less …….
One way to improve service is to fine the people responsible including the CEO.

yep FINE THE CEO!!! I’m sure the CEO’s salary can cover the fine ^_^

aiyoyo

is it like people say

left pocket go to right pocket?

aiyoyo

I saw another article like this on TODAY too.

Thankfully, someone brought this up.

too little fine.

very strange.