Confessions of a former bus driver
For the last seven years, the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) has been trying to implement a fixed-wage system for bus drivers. Their main reason is to eliminate speeding and recklessness, which is the direct result of keeping up with the old-fashioned performance-based compensation package. Years have gone by and still, the accidents and rash driving behavior continue.
DOLE’s solution
DOLE made a big move this year by getting its own National Wages and Productivity Commission (NWPC) to implement Guidelines No. 1 Series of 2019 last March 9. It is a set of operational guidelines for a part-fixed, part performancebased compensation scheme.
The last part is where the problem lies. While it may seem complex, the situation is rather elementary. Bus companies and operators will never accept a package without a performance-based incentive.
Drivers want to hit the road as hard as they can, as fast as they can because that means more money, for them and the bus company. Going fast is fun, if you’re an F1 driver. But if you’re entrusted with the lives of commuters, children, fathers with young daughters, mothers with little sons, babies, grandmothers, going fast and being careless on the road is the last thing you want these public utility bus drivers to do.
The confession
As I continued to make sense of this seemingly chicken and egg situation, luck intervened and I had a chance to ride a Grab driven by a former PUB driver. Just seven months removed from his previous job, he laid out some interesting facts about what they do, why they do it and who can fix it.
To hit his quota as a city bus driver (and get a performance-based bonus), he had to take at least six roundtrips on EDSA. The number may seem small but remember that’s just the minimum, and with the amount of time they take at bus stops, you can just imagine how long a roundtrip takes.
Most of them start as early as 3 a.m. to get as many trips in before EDSA becomes a parking lot. This means they wake up at 1 a.m. every day.
On the topic of taking the PUB driver performance-enhancing drug ‘shabu’, my guy told me that he doesn’t take it, but admits that some do. What he does is take naps in the afternoon — some 15-20 minutes — before heading back out again.
Unbeknownst to many, bus companies have a schedule of when PUBs drive out of the terminal. This is so they don’t all come out at the same time. But he says drivers just grease up the dispatcher and they’re off.
Remember in 2011 when Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) started a program training female bus drivers? He does too because those days, no bus conductor wanted to ride with these female drivers.
Lady PUB drivers, as per their TESDA training, followed traffic rules and regulations, which made them drive so slow. That meant none of them were meeting their quotas and making serious money. Where are these female drivers now? They’re still all on the road, but now they drive just like the men do. In fact, my guy said he was sharply cut off one time by, you guessed it, a lady PUB driver.
Simple solution
I ask him for the best solution and he says only the government can fix this and it will only happen if they make a hard-enough stance.
He then proceeded to spit out the plain and ugly truth: bus companies/operators and even drivers will look out only for their best interests. They’ll just keep on keeping on even if it totally paralyzes EDSA.
How does he drive now that he has his own car? Even after being a PUB driver for 10 years, he drove more defensively than 90-percent of private motorists on the road; he was courteous on the road, allowed other vehicles to merge, and even pedestrians to cross. That’s what happens when you’re driving your own car, he says.
He does lose it behind the wheel sometimes but only when he gets cut-off by PUB drivers. I guess they’re not immune to their own venom.
Oh and by the way, he says PUB drivers think private motorists are chicken. That’s why they bully you on the road a lot. He adds that if you’re brave enough, give ‘em a dose of their own medicine and see them turn ‘yellow’, just like the lane they’re supposed to stay in.
The hunt for solutions continues. Maybe the new NWPC guidelines are the answer, or maybe not. Only time and the number of accidents involving buses will tell, so it’s going to be another wait-and-see situation. This isn’t an eye-opener but more of an insight to the lives of these people, who seem like heartless machines on the road. They’re really not, but they’re in an industry that forces them to be merciless savages on the road, literally.