A bus terminal in Cubao, Quezon City revealed that it had to limit the amount of its daily trips as passengers have come few and far between in recent weeks amid ongoing fuel price hikes in the market.

In an exclusive interview with DAILY TRIBUNE, Pacifico Bibon said that their company had to employ different strategies to offset the higher costs of operation.

Whereas passengers would typically fill the waiting areas of terminals in previous years, particularly a couple of days before a holiday like the Holy Week break, Bibon noted that he had observed a stark decline in commuters.

“Ang nangyari po talaga niyan ay umonti yung biyahe namin dahil maraming mga commuter ang hindi na bumabyahe ngayon,” he said.

Bibon claimed that he thinks that the development was brought by the public opting to save their money instead of going on leisurely trips.

As a result, the terminal that he works for was said to cut its daily trips to Bicol and other regions of southern Luzon in half, going from an average of 16 to just eight.

In an effort to make the most of the trips, Bibon said that the company has also resorted to combining schedules of buses which may utilize the same route to reach their respective destinations.

“Ginagawa nga po namin ay kapag talagang walang wala talaga at kaunti lang, cinocombine na po namin at luge po ang kompanya,” he explained.

He noted that customers who booked their trips ahead of time are contacted and informed of the updated schedule to ensure that they would not have to wait for a long time at the terminals.

As for passengers that may not make it to the new time, Bibon said that they offer the option of rebooking to a different date that works best for the individual.

The combination of trips was done as a cost-effective measure to ensure that gas was not wasted on trips that carried barely 50 percent of a bus’ maximum capacity.

Bibon asserted that the issue was a unique situation in all his years working as a dispatcher in the terminal.

“Hindi naman nangyayari samin yan taon taon eh, dahil matagal na po ako dito naka pwesto, pinaka mahinang takbo namin diyan kapag talagang walang wala, mahina, 12 eh ngayon walo,” he said.