Klao Bell, Staff Reporter
SOME conductors on buses operated by the Jamaica Urban Transport Company (JUTC), have been suspected of pocketing fares instead of putting the money in the till.
Major Desmond Brown, managing director of Metropolitan Management Transport Holdings Limited (MMTH), which owns JUTC, revealed that this has affected the company's revenue.
"We feel that some conductors are not returning all the money; a substantial amount is being lost to conductors," Major Brown told The Sunday Gleaner recently.
Despite the operating procedure on the buses, where passengers should be issued a ticket in exchange for paying bus fares of $10, $20 and $30, conductors still find ways of defrauding the company of revenue.
"They have found all kinds of ways, they re-sell used tickets or cash $10 for a $20 ticket," Major Brown said.
But he is not alone in this assertion. Conductors admit that their colleagues steal, some justifying the theft with the claim that, "the big man dem a tief more than we".
A conductor on a number 74 bus, which plies the downtown Kingston to Barbican route said, "Theft is going on, of course, but what conductors are taking is not huge."
A conductress operating on a number 60 bus, which travels from Papine to downtown Kingston insisted that, "the company just a find fault with everybody. The big man them is the tief...tell me, you hear them seh anything when we have ova's money - what them do with that," said the robust conductress.
She described "ova's money" as cash that exceeds the amount tallied by the Wayfarer collection system installed on the buses to calculate funds and issue tickets.
"Ova's" money results when inaccurate change has been issued. Or, when money is collected from, but no ticket issued to, persons who are short of the appropriate amount for bus fare.
But, the company sees this money only when employees are honest. Clifton Grant, vice president of the University and Allied Workers Union (UAWU) which represents JUTC bus and maintenance crew, believes most of the workers are.
"There are a lot of problems in JUTC and it is not fair to blame the workers...90 per cent of the workers are honest. The matter of theft has not been addressed formally but we have heard it said," Mr. Grant said.
One conductor explained that what is misconstrued as theft by the company is "just a honest mistake".
"Sometimes plenty people a come up inna di bus. Seh, like all five school children come up one time, mi jus start punch up ticket fi school children. But when you look, a adult come up inna di bus, but mi done punch up a extra children ticket so mi jus gi har the school children ticket," said the conductor who was collecting on a number 78 bus that plies the August Town to downtown Kingston route.
"I never stole anything from the bus yet," said the conductor and reported that he places all the cash in the till - "even when it's ova's."
Yet, another conductress, who was offended that her colleagues are being perceived as thieves said, "The good always have to suffer for the bad, a nuh nuff people a tief, is a few."
She was waiting for her bus to leave the Half-Way Tree bus park.
