Many techies shun BMTC Volvo buses for cabs

Even as the Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation (BMTC) is counting its losses mostly incurred by AC Volvo buses, the air conditioned taxis plying at affordable rates which most techies now prefer have added to the woes of the transport company.

The software professionals, who have been depending on BMTC’s AC buses for their everyday commute, are now shunning the buses for aggregator taxis causing a huge loss to the transport corporation. The new trend is causing a worry to BMTC specially on the IT corridors such as ITPL, Whitefield and Kadugodi.

On most of these routes, about 25,000 to 30,000 IT professionals travel everyday. BMTC runs its majority of the Volvo buses on these routes and in the recent days, the number of passengers in the buses are dwindling thanks mainly to the numerous cabs.

Since the advent of the cab aggregators including TaxiForSure, Ola and Uber, the BMTC has estimated its everyday losses to the tune of Rs 10,000 to Rs 12,000 per bus. Already, BMTC is trying to recover from its accumulated loss to the tune of Rs 140 crore and the present trend is only making matters worse for the corporation.

Some of the software professionals who, were earlier taking BMTC buses, say that not only the taxis are economical, they are comfortable as well as they can get dropped at their doorsteps.

Many other bus users, who have now shifted to taxis, say that the taxis provide them the much-needed last-mile connectivity at much cheaper rates and they are able to save time and money.

Compared to the fare of a Volvo bus which is anywhere between Rs 35 and Rs 120, the aggregator taxis work out cheaper as some of them offer fares of Rs 10 per kilometre or a base fare of Rs 30 and Rs 8 per kilometre.

However, the BMTC officials do not see this as a perpetual threat and say that it would not be long before the taxis jack up their promotional fares and the people will come back to the trusted BMTC buses.