Private bus owners today expressed their disappointment in the Private Transport Ministry’s lack of support in introducing the new pre-paid card system which cannot be implemented without the full support of the ministry, the Private Bus Owners Association said today.

PBOA President Gemunu Wijeyratne said that plans are set to launch a pilot project on a pre-paid travel card for private bus travellers on September 24, the association’s 10th anniversary, but said that the ministry has still not extended adequate support to the project. Wijeyratne said the Central Bank approved pre-paid card project could be a success if the authorities extended their support to the private bus owners to introduce the new system successfully.

“The private bus industry in Sri Lanka incurs an immense loss of more than Rs.13 billion annually due to the current system of collecting bus change from passengers. The government incurs an annual loss of about Rs.500 million owning to the production of coins each year. The pre-paid card system would benefit everyone and would be far less of a hassle,” he said. The pilot project will be conducted for about a period of one month on the Gampaha-Colombo and Mattegoda-Pitakotte routes.

There are some 20,500 private buses in Sri Lanka out of which some 15,000 are owned by members of the PBOA. (Olindhi Jayasundere)