Dubai: School Transport Services (STS), the largest school bus service in the UAE, is increasing its bus fares by Dh20 as of April 1.
M. Augustine, STS managing director, told XPRESS: “We have decided to increase fares across the board in all the emirates by Dh20 from April 1.
“This is a very nominal hike considering the huge cost of our operations covering a fleet of 1,600 smart buses that transport over 60,000 children from 65 schools every day.”
Huge responsibility
The new fares, also applicable to buses operated by Bright Bus Transport under STS in Sharjah, Ajman and Umm Al Quwain, have been conveyed to parents through a circular. Augustine said running a school bus fleet of the size of STS and ensuring the safety of children travelling in them come with a huge responsibility.
“To begin with, all our buses are smart buses fitted with GPS technology, electronic attendance scanners, video surveillance systems and other devices like sleeping child check buttons, panic buttons, transistor films etc.
The installation of these devices alone costs us Dh30,000 per bus. The cost of maintenance is additional – we have two engineers per school to ensure that the technology is up and running.”
Augustine said the task of replacing STS’ 70-seater buses with 48-seater vehicles as per the Road Transport Authority’s requirements has also been a huge challenge.
