SEREMBAN: The people in the state will be able to access the bus’ location and estimated time of arrival following the move by the MyBas Seremban service operator, Cityliner Sdn Bhd, to launch a mobile application in August.
Transport Minister Anthony Loke Siew Fook, who is on a one-day working visit to the state, said apart from that, MyBas Seremban would also introduce cashless services in its operations.
“Everyone can download the application on their mobile phones and can see the bus’ movement, meaning, if they are waiting at the bus stop, they will be able to know when the bus will arrive.
“By next year, all MyBas Seremban services in Negri Sembilan will implement cashless transaction starting with Touch ‘n Go cards and no longer accept coin or paper money. This is a tremendous trend that we are encouraging as the country moves towards the cashless society. This will benefit the community,” he told reporters, here today.
Also present were Land Public Transport Agency (Apad) director-general Azlan Shah Parames Albakri and several state executive councillors.
Loke said the MyBas Seremban mobile application was developed by service operators in the state and he also encouraged MyBas operators in other states to follow similar steps.
“This is one of operators’ initiatives ... of course it will incur more cost as it will be fully borne by them. But to the operators, the more efficient they can run their services the better for them, because if they don’t run their services efficiently they will get the penalty.
“If they run services efficiently, it will give more confidence to the government to renew their contract. They have to think about this because the contract will not last forever. If they don’t run their services efficiently, we will always review their contract and might decide not to renew it,” he said.
Apart from Negri Sembilan, Loke said MyBas services were also established in Perlis, Terengganu and Perak, but not on a large scale.
“Negri Sembilan is the first state to start this MyBas service initiative and this is one of the pilot projects in Negri Sembilan and that is why MyBas Seremban is now expanded to cover all parts in the state and not limited to Seremban only,” he said.
MyBas Seremban service started in November 2015 and has 98 buses operated by Cityliner Sdn Bhd as the main operator with four other operators, namely, Syarikat Unitedbas Sdn Bhd, Southern Omnibus Co Bhd, KR Travel and Tours Sdn Bhd and Gopi Travel and Tours Sdn Bhd. - Bernama
