FOR the third time this year, parents who ferry their children to school by private bus are facing the prospect of a rise in fees.
This time, however, they say they are resigned to paying more and will not make too much of a fuss because it means their children will get a safer ride to school.
But all the parents interviewed by The Straits Times had one plea: keep the fee increases manageable.
They were responding to a statement by Singapore School Transport Association secretary Tan Nam Soon that fees will have to go up in the wake of yesterday's announcement that all school buses have to be fitted with seat belts by 2011.
The rule, he said, meant buses will carry fewer children, because the 3:2 child-to-seat ratio no longer applies. A seat fitted with a belt can hold only one child and small buses, which can normally carry 15 children, will have to drop this number to 10.
Bus drivers' incomes will thus fall, Mr Tan said, and they will have to make up for it by raising fees.
While most parents interviewed said they were willing to pay more, they added that a big increase would be hard to swallow for two reasons.
First, bus operators had raised fees earlier this year, citing higher fuel prices.
Second, the cost of retrofitting the buses will be borne by the Government and drivers will be getting a subsidy of up to $3,000 to boot, to make up for a potential drop in earnings.
Housewife Kok Hiew Thin, 40, who has three children in Bukit View Primary, said the increase should be capped at 10 per cent. 'I am willing to pay more for my children's safety, but I won't be happy if they increase it by too much. They already increased fares this year.'
Mrs Sharon Seow, 36, who has two daughters at Haig Girls' School, said she will have to pay up if fees are raised because she has little choice. Both she and her husband work and they need a school bus to get their girls to class.
If past experience is any gauge, fees will go up by about 10 to 20 per cent.
When childcare chain Cherie Hearts decided four years ago that the buses it used to transport children to 12 of its 40 centres should have seat belts, it forked out the money for retrofitting and charged parents 10 to 20 per cent more for transport.
The vice-chairman of the parents' association at Henry Park Primary, Mr Malcolm Choi, said he was confident that any increases would be tamped down.
'Parents are very anxious to know if their children are safe on the roads. I think many will be willing to pay for peace of mind.
'But I believe that, through negotiations with parents and bus operators and because of the government subsidies, the fees won't be increased too much.'
For some parents, however, any amount is too much. Part-time sales manager Cristin Tan, 40, who has two children in Anderson Primary, said: 'This is unacceptable.
'The bus operators increased the bus fares when oil prices went up this year but did not adjust the fares when they came down.
'If they want to increase the fares again, I will stop using the buses and get my children to and from school myself.'
Apart from the hike earlier this year and talk of another one now, school bus fares were also in the news last month when the Education Ministry announced that all primary schools would switch to a single session in future.
This raised the possibility that classes could start later.
But when contacted then, bus operators said that a later school start could be costly for them. They would have to choose between ferrying schoolchildren and the more lucrative business of transporting factory workers, not both, as they do now.
To make up for this loss, they said, they would either have to give up sending children to school or increase fees.
This article was first published in The Straits Times on Oct 17, 2008.
