Tan Kin Lian's Blog: Public transport fares, service and profits

Friday, June 04, 2010

Public transport fares, service and profits

A vandal broke in to a MRT depot and painted graffiti on a train. The vandalism was not noticed by the employees for some time, until a video was posted on Youtube by a passenger. What does this tell us?

SMRT has cut down its employees to be bare minimum to reduce cost and improve profits. It would have been better if SMRT had employed more people and show a smaller (but still healthy profit). This will create jobs for more people to provide better security and improve customer service. They should also run more trains to reduce the congestion and waiting time.

These actions can be taken without increasing the fares, as SMRT is showing a healthy profit. The Public Transport Council has to be more vigilent in moniting the fares, level of service and profits of our bus and train operators.

This is an example of the failure of the unregulated market in getting the right outcome for the country.

Tan Kin Lian

12 comments:

Anonymous said...: This is an opportunity to apply productivity initiatives:

Hire workers who have more than 2 eyes.; June 04, 2010 9:22 AM
C H Yak said...: The HR Department of the SMRT does not believe in "human guard" security, they believe in having "cameras" security. Look at the number of cameras at each exit they are installing...LOL.

What if the culprit was a terrorist and planted a timed bomb in that MRT train for the morning "sardined" crowd?

They would think that it was HOMETEAM's job to ensure security. This is a big issue about interfacing responsibilities between our GOVT departments.

Or is that a job for the Super-Salaried DPM Jaya?; June 04, 2010 11:15 AM
Chee Ming said...: I do not think that it is a failure of unregulated market. I think that it is the nature of a duopoly. (We do have some duopoly, points to paid TV service)

Public Transport is a merit service and, therefore, it should not be driven by profit. But unfortunately, our Public Transport IS.; June 04, 2010 11:26 AM
Anonymous said...: This tell us you need more than 2 "eyes" - more automated surveilance system is required, not more people.

Any possibility is that the painted graffiti may look like art so they delayed cleaning it off.

Lastly, install stiffer fines and punishment. This will deter would-be vandals.

Increasing manpower is only increasing overheads and should only be the last resort. We must ensure we can be cheaper, faster, better and not the other way around.; June 04, 2010 12:15 PM
Anonymous said...: Unbelievable, SMRT did not notice the grafitti tillmuch later.
Ever tried to inform the staff that there is a suspicious bag on the train?
I tried, and it was a hassle, the staff give you an impression that we are overly suspicious, and the response is slow. If there is a terror act, the station would be a goner.
Cutting costs at the expense of security. No wonder Mat Selamat got away under the nose of the Authorities, we still think the terrorist was discreetly allowed to escape. Else the security must be very lousy in Singapore.; June 04, 2010 1:40 PM
Anonymous said...: Actually Singapore is lucky that there are no suicide terrorists who will plant bombs in MRT and other crowded public places.

Or is it because our checkpoints are well protected? If so, then how come Mas Selamat could escape in 2008 without being caught here?

Or earlier in 2004 a wanted child killer could even walk away from police custody and crossed the causeway?

Maybe the terrorists consider Singapore not worth the bombing.

Because terrorists sometimes fight for a legimate cause but using violent means, they also want it to have effect. So they bombed the big countries. Bombing Singapore may achieve nothing so why waste bombs, their lives and our lives?

Furthermore Singapore does not cause harm to them or their cause unlike USA or Israel.

Hence only lunatic cases like graffiti painting on MRT trains happened here. Or violent and brutal crimes like the slash, rob and kill cases a few days ago. And only parangs were used.; June 04, 2010 9:05 PM
Lye Khuen Way said...: Must add my 2 cents worth !
You can automate as much as you care, but at the end of the day, like they say, you still need some "human being" to decide if any actions/ follow ups are needed or not.
I agree with Mr Tan that SMRT for one is too Profit orientated. It is uniquely, Singapore.; June 04, 2010 9:57 PM
Anonymous said...: rex comments as follows,

In my opinion this incident should not be linked to the alleged MRT policy of cutting back on manpower to reap profits. Suppose MRT didnt cut cost on employee headcounts. And they deploy 2 jagas at every depot in Singapore. Is that what we want? Is that more efficient, just to employ jagas to handle rather improbable events of occasional pranksters? In my opinion, security cameras are cost effective measures. If the swiss guy climbed over the fence and the act was videotaped and eventually he was caught, then the system worked and we just follow up from there.

So the lesson to learn is not to start employing more staff and reverse the manpower policy based on this incident alone (i will not say about other incidents which may justifiably need more manpower)

Instead the lesson to learn is just that MRT have to increase the height or the quality and technical aspects of barbed wire barriers and perhaps to cover more areas.

It is not about employee headcounts and super profits, in this incident.

rex; June 05, 2010 11:00 AM
Anonymous said...: remember one Minister say,"every worker has 2 hands and 2 legs"? erh..dah?!! and now we may add, "every worker has also 2 eyes"
get the meaning, if you don't is ok, because this is how our highly paid Minister talk and speak in parliament.; June 05, 2010 2:05 PM
Anonymous said...: The security fence itself is already a deterrence. Shall not rule out that it could be a carefully planned attack to overcome whatever deterrence in place.; June 06, 2010 2:28 AM
Anonymous said...: We should thank the vandal having woken up all of us.; June 06, 2010 2:50 PM
Anonymous said...: We are being complacence, is time to stand guard depot.; June 06, 2010 6:20 PM