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| Picture taken from the net (credits to the owner) |
My family owns a small tourist bus company and we've been operating since 2005 (or probably earlier than that because we also operated commuter buses prior to tourist buses). I would like to reiterate that we are "small", because majority of the tourist bus companies in the Philippines are just as small as we are.
Up to this time, we are lucky because in the many years of our operation, we have not encountered any major (i.e. death-causing) accident yet. We are continuously praying that we don't experience what the owners of Panda Coach are going through right now.
Because of this accident, The Department of Education and The Commission on Higher Education have issued a moratorium on educational field trips. This, of course, will affect the whole tourism industry, including us. Ganyan naman palagi kapag may naaaksidenteng tourist bus / students sa field trips, damay-damay lahat.
We've been updating ourselves with the news on this accident and sadly, most people are blaming the school and/or Panda Coach for this tragedy. We cannot blame them. When something bad happens, it has to be somebody's fault. But as a bus operator myself (albeit inactive as of this moment), I just wish to give a bit of my perspective on this matter.
Accidents happen. That's a fact. People would argue that the company should be properly maintaining their fleet to avoid road mishaps and I agree. No bus operator would want to receive a call in the middle of the day (or night) learning that their unit got involved in an accident. We are fervently hoping for a smooth trip every time a bus leaves our garage. But experience tells us that it is nearly impossible to guarantee a 100% hassle-free trip to our customers. Again, a lot of things can happen on the road. And no mechanic, now matter how experienced he is, could assure us that no mechanical problem would arise during the trip. Especially since the buses are not really "brand new" to start with.
And this leads to another argument against the bus company -- why are your buses not brand new?
A brand new tourist bus would cost at least six million pesos. There is no way that we could ever recover that amount with the rate that we are being paid with for our services. For a field trip within Metro Manila, we only get paid around Php9,000 to Php10,000 gross. Try to do the Math, factor in the trip expenses - fuel, driver's salary and food allowance, toll fees (since we are from Bulacan), washing. We are lucky if we are left with Php3,000. Oops, that is not net income yet. What about the wear and tear of the vehicle, salary/benefits of employees, spare parts, business taxes, franchise fees, and other operations costs? Tapos mga lagay pa sa LTO, LTFRB, DOT, MMDA, pulis, etc.
Contrary to what many thinks, the bulk of the field trip fees that the schools collected from their students go to the "middle men" -- yung laway lang ang puhunan. Many schools get charterers (i.e. tour operators) to organize their trip. It is them who earn a lot from from the trips. Saka pala yung mga school officials na may commission per pax. We are at the bottom of every transaction. Whatever that's left from the sharing, yun na lang ang binabayad sa amin.
Why can't we charge higher rates? Competition. Colorum buses killed us. They lowered their rates, too low that we who operate legally are having a hard time to keep up. Kaya nga madalas wala kaming biyahe, nasusulot kasi may mas mura raw. Unlike commuter buses, our buses don't run every day. We have to rely on charterers to survive (majority of our trips come from them). Hence, sila ang nagtatakda ng presyo. This is the reason why small tourist bus companies remain small.
Tourist bus companies also get blamed for getting "inefficient" drivers. Yes, the Management is certainly responsible for its employees. But like any business owners or HR practitioners would know, many employees will surprise you later on. You hired them because you've had the impression that they were ok, pero hindi pala sa kalaunan. Or in some cases, your employees are generally good pero nagkakaproblema din syempre paminsan-minsan which affects their performance.
No bus operator would intentionally hire a "bad" (kaskasero, barumbado, adik) driver. That will be business suicide. But because the drivers work "on their own," we cannot observe them all the time. And we can't just fire an erring driver, mind you. There's DOLE that we have to answer to.
I have to be clear, I am not saying that the bus operators are faultless. The school, the tour operator, the bus owner, and the driver involved have their share of responsibility (and liability) to that accident in Tanay. Even several government agencies can take some blame. To condemn just one party is certainly not fair.
Thousands of field trips are being conducted every year and a single accident does not represent the whole. Accidents happen, whether we like it or not.
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