Twitter user @hennxhen shared an unsavoury incident involving her cousin who was stuck in the JB customs for 4 hours, and ended up missing her bus home to KL.
She was allegedly asked to pay RM500 for another seat, and the netizen took to Twitter to send a public message to the Malaysian minister of transport, Anthony Loke.
Here is what she said
Unprivate my twitter to bring this to YB’s attention
@anthonyloke Happy New Year YB. There’s something that I would like to highlight to your attention. My cousin just came back, via bus, from Singapore at midnight and arrived at KL at dawn earlier today (21.01.2023).
What happened was that it took her roughly 4 hours to get through the JB customs. As a consequence of this extremely long delay due to CNY, the bus that she was supposed to take, left the customs, leaving her and apparently a few other passengers at the customs.
She was informed that the bus could not be waiting at the customs for an extensive time or it more cause more congestion. Problem here is that the customs department should have envisaged such congestion during festivities and should not be chasing the buses away.
So what of the passengers who have paid for the bus tickets, traveled from different destinations in Singapore, to the customs, just to b left behind? Are they supposed to head back to Sg?
What happened after is worse. My cousin and the other passengers was then approached by a person who apparently is the person in charge (PIC). This PIC is seen to be leading a group of left-behind passengers and segregating them into different new buses who are heading to the passengers’ supposed destinations. This seems like a knight in shining armor saving the day right? Until my cousin was told that to board the new bus, she is required to pay an additional RM500.
Bear in mind this is on top of the bus ticket that she has already purchased previously. Being a young girl, stranded alone in the middle of the night at the customs so far away from home (KL), she had no choice but to pay the additional RM500 or she will be stranded alone at the customs at midnight, for god knows how long. At that point of time she only has RM600 with her.
YB, is it appropriate and/or even lawful for the these PICs and/or bus drivers to collect all these additional payments (an exorbitant amount of RM500) from these passengers who were never at fault for being stranded at the customs?
I know the RM500 my cousin paid is not recoverable. But I believe my cousin, and my other passengers who have been in this situation, who had no choice but to fork out an enormous additional RM500, would appreciate if YB could look into this issue.
Bus drivers and whoever is in charge of facilitating passengers from the customs back their busses, SHOULD NOT be taking advantage of these poor stranded passengers. Thank you for reading this YB. Have a great year ahead.