Our New LCCT

I had a chance to use our newly launched LCCT when i touched down from bangkok two days ago (march 25). all i can say is the project was not well executed. i don't think the owner of this project didn't plan it well or wanted this project to fail. however, i believe, along the line, there were some issues that were out of control.

for examples:

1. the autogate for malaysian chip-based passport was not ready. probably the supplier did not get the hardware delivery in time, or there were hardware failures.

2. no custom officers were ready at the malaysian passport counters until there were long queues. probably the custom officers were not being alerted of the arrival of two carriers one after another at that point of time. (who monitors the arrival of carriers?)

3. no proper signage for shuttle bus between the lcct and klia. people were very used to the klia express between klia and kl sentral. when ppl first touch down to a new terminal, definitely there will be "lost souls" and need to navigate around.

4. the air stewardess onboard the airasia announced that there will be a shuttle bus service from the lcct to kl sentral directly, with a cost of only RM9. this is good, but kind of inconvenient for those who have big luggages.

5. i asked the lcct-klsentral service counter about the shuttle service between lcct-klia, and was told that it will cost only RM1.50, and the helpful lady pointed me to a bus stopped not far away. This is cheap.

6. when i arrived at the bus stop, i saw the bus that was indicated did not have any signage showing that it's a shuttle for lcct-klia, but another bus was. after asking three guys with klia employee tags, i boarded the one labelled with lcct-klia shuttle. and these three guys boarded the same bus 10 minutes later.

7. the shuttle bus left the lcct and heading to klia soon after the three klia staff boarded the bus, and apparently one of them was the driver. however, when asked, they have no idea the frequency of the shuttle bus service. maybe they do not know the response of the passangers on this service, and therefore cannot make up a schedule.

8. it took the shuttle bus 20 minutes to arrive at the klia.

if the carrier were to stop at klia terminal:
1. i would have saved 30 minutes and would have arrived at kl sentral by the time i arrived at klia.

2. i would have reach home 30 minutes earlier.

the authorities announced that the lcct was needed and built to encourage more low cost carrier to come to malaysia, and to attrack more foreign travellers to malaysia via lcc. however, i believe a lot of malaysians who use the klia often definitely can notice that our existing klia terminals still have a lot of capacity to take in more travellers.

can the klia terminals charge the low cost carriers less for using the klia terminals? since the cost of building the lcct is at RM108 million, and there is definitely ongoing maintenance costs (but not announced, i think this number will not be available until the lcct is used for 1 year), can these costs be used to subsidize for the low cost carriers? anyway the low cost carriers were using less facilities in the klia terminals.

i do understand why singapore needs a lcct. changi airport has reached its capacity because they have more than double the flight frequencies klia has (my estimation, but i guess anyone who had a chance to use both airports will be able to find out as well). therefore, i think instead of having a third normal terminal, they built a lcct to suit the needs of low cost carriers.

Living getting more expansive

The 30 cents increase in gas price effective yesterday created a huge shock wave throughout malaysia. prices of other goods and services are going to increase, inevitably. like it or not, this is the fact and there is no turning back.

i think, from the perspective of macro economic, the price increase is unavoidable. government officials always telling the same story, "Our (oil) price is among the lowest in this region, even in AP." This statement has been used uncountable times by government officials, even ministers for many occasions. but the bad news is the over gdp and income of average family or inividual are also among the lowest in this region! i think the government did not consider that!

the domino effect of the increase of oil price will be transportation, food, and this means almost everything essential in our daily life. however, our salaries and wages does not increase porpotionately. that's the sad part.

well, since this is the fact of life, we got to learn how to deal with it. and this means spend less.