APSRTC service quality improvisation

What was the problem? :

Over the years there were growing problems in R.T.C that aroused different difficulties for the passengers. The major problems included no details of bus routes and bus timings in bus stands, fitness of the buses, preference of luggage, ID cards for employees of R.T.C, Cleanliness of buses, etc. among various others.

What do rules say? :

A.P.S.R.T.C is the major road transport corporation in Andhra Pradesh that provides bus facilities all over the state. The services of R.T.C vary from district services to city services including various others too. It should take all necessary steps to provide the required facility to each and every passenger.

What have we done? :

We lodged a complaint, on 11-11-2009, with 30 complaints and suggestions, to the R.T.C and asked to take the required actions, so as to rectify their drawbacks to provide quality service. But the complaint was not taken seriously. So we used RTI act to file an application, on 14-12-2009, requesting an action taken report on the complaint lodged and the conversational note files with each department concerned.

Actions taken:

The reply came on 10-02-2010 with all the action taken reports and the note files of conversation between the concerned departments. Though the total information was not fully furnished, some issues were clarified and some cases were solved. The suggestions were said to be accepted, but the steps taken to implement those were not mentioned. They also defended themselves in some serious issues like Fitness certificates of buses, where they said that all buses are in good fitness conditions. This doesn’t seem to be true when we look at so many ordinary buses, running on roads, that don’t seem to be in good condition.

Though this is a partial victory by us, we have achieved to gain some information about:

• The presence of complaints book with each conductor.
• The steps taken to provide timetable to each and every bus stop, with depot manager and other concerned authorities phone numbers.
• Their confession regarding the destination boards, which were not available in many routes and also not present in our regional language.
• The plans to provide bus service to all the villages that are a bit far away from the main road.
• The formation of teams to have regular inspection of private vehicles. The teams include R.T.C, R.T.A and Police department officials.

This is the power of R.T.I to evoke some response on a complaint lodged against an organization, which otherwise wouldn’t have cared.

Please download Complaint, RTI and Replies here.