EDITORIAL - How to motivate drivers

According to a story in this newspaper, some drivers of the Libreng Sakay program along the 01K route are no longer stopping for passengers because they are no longer getting incentives for picking up as many passengers as they can.

The complaints came from commuters who reported these to the office of Cebu City Councilor Winston Pepito, chairman of the Committee on Transportation.

Councilor Pepito said he verified for himself that some drivers of these Libreng Sakay program often do just one round trip and choose what time to travel, mostly avoiding peak hours. He also saw several of them just sitting in a canteen instead of driving their routes.

We would imagine being paid a set fee would be a public utility driver’s dream as it frees him from the stress of picking up as much passengers as he can. It’s also good for passengers because they won’t be packed into a vehicle as if they were sardines in a can.

Indeed, this is how drivers of public utility are paid in developed countries; they have a fixed salary for their main service which is driving, they aren’t paid on the number of passengers they pick up.

So the assumption we would have is that drivers who no longer have to feel the pressure of securing as many passengers as they can would still regularly do their jobs. But obviously this doesn’t seem to be happening here.

Between the stability of a set fee and the instability of payment received based on how many passengers one can get, we would think they would prefer the stable set fee, but no, it doesn’t seem that way.

Technically, we understand why they are doing this. They want to maximize earnings after all. But as a consequence of their, shall we say “selfishness”, many commuters are stranded out in the streets waiting for a ride to work or home. And those drivers aren’t doing enough of what they are being paid to do.

The question now is how to motivate these drivers to do their jobs. Pepito said he will leave the decision to the sanctioning body of the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board.