Charging in excess:

Investigations on over-charging bus crews

Disna Mudalige

Investigations are on against 125 bus operators over the raids conducted by the Flying Squad and passenger complaints, National Transport Commission Operations Director H W Vipulasena told the Daily News yesterday.

He said that 25 bus operators were nabbed by the Flying Squad for over charging commuters during the New Year season. Ten bus operators were charged before the New Year and another 15 were charged after the New Year, he said.

He said that the Commission had also received about 100 passenger complaints and over 50 percent of them were about over charging. Rest of the complaints were on incidents such as not providing the balance properly and indisciplined or unsuitable behaviour of conductors.

He said that letters were sent to these bus operators asking them to report for the investigations. The investigations were started last week and the Commission hopes to conclude them within next two to three weeks. Action would be taken against them based on the result of these investigations, he said.

He also said that most of the complaints belong to the buses which were granted additional permits by the Provincial Councils.

He said that special attention had been given to discuss with the Provincial Council officials to take possible measures to prevent these incidents repeating.