If the pending petition to cut the PUJ fare will be approved from P7 to P6.50 as minimum fare, passengers cannot fully enjoy the said rollback because of the centavos issue. We do know that during the time when the PUJ minimum fare was P7.50, drivers collected P8 for the reason they do not have enough coins.
So, history will repeat itself, sure as is, as P6.50 minimum fare is a question of implementation that even the Land Transportation and Regulatory Board-7 do not have a clear solution.
So can we expect again scenarios of drivers getting fares of P7, instead of P6.50? A big yes! It is 99 percent sure. And here we go again, LTFRB-7 will be announcing to report to their office, those drivers who will overcharged and not following the minimum fare. Can we expect passengers to waste their time to report for a mere centavo issues? A very small percentage will go, maybe. But will this happen everyday, we experienced these before, remember? So how can LTFRB-7 expect the same complainant that will report to them in a daily basis, because we can expect that after you report one overcharging case to them, you will experience another one by the next day, and another day. The problem is so rampant that LTFRB-7 cannot just leave it all to the passengers.
Not even the students can depend on this, as if we compute the 20 percent student discount on the expected P6.50 minimum fare, the result will be P5.20 as student fare. But the question is, are PUJ drivers are following the rules? If a student will give P6, can they expect a 75 centavos change? Surely no! And even for fare of two students with a P20 bill, and they will declare they are students, PUJ driver will deduct P12 instead of P10.20.
I mean come on, we all witness these kind of scenario before.
So the better alternative for the LTFRB to do is, instead of putting in a fare tariff that students fare is P5.20, just put P5 instead, as drivers are expected not to follow the P5.20 rule.
LTFRB in Negros has done that before because they knew, drivers will take advantage of the LTFRB rule on fares.
LTFRB-7 must learn from the past, that PUJ drivers are taking advantage of fare with lose change issues. It's somehow better for them to hire their own agents to observed the everyday situation inside PUJ's wherein the issues of overloading, cutting trips and overcharging happens. If LTFRB-7 will continue their style of waiting reports of violations from the passengers alone, things will always be the same. There will be no major changes in the implementation of rules in our PUJ system. How can you expect changes that if PUJ driver violators are hundreds roaming our streets every day and LTFRB only received five complaints? What will happen to other violators? Besides the burden of filing a complaint to the LTFRB office wherein we have to be absent in our work just to attend hearings is just as not advisable as it may sound. LTFRB received the penalty fees, but to the complainants, they don't have even a monetary reward for reporting violators.Can we have rewards for that?
I hope LTFRB-7 can have a feedback on this. This was the same problem years ago. And please don't give us the same answer, the same ineffective solutions again. For the things mentioned in here are surely will happen. Don't blink. It's coming.