Transpo Dumps Deadline For LRT Service Resumption

My cynical side is wondering if it just might be that they were aware of this new delay much earlier than today but held off on announcing it until after the point where most people would already have paid for their August transit passes. It’s harder for customers to decide to abandon them for another mode of transportation once they’ve tied up $125 in a pass for the month.

The notion they would do that is supported by their response to the suggestion that they should give some kind of compensation to their customers. The response has been basically that the transit company is millions of dollars in deficit and they would have to examine carefully any possible remediation. What they fail to comprehend is that those customers, in purchasing passes or tickets were in fact buying a service that OC Transpo has failed to deliver. They have broken their contract with their customers and they will just have to figure out a way to make their customers whole again.

Someone needs to point out to them that they are a service organization. It’s what they’re set up, in theory, to do. Why would they expect their customer base to absorb the cost of their non-provision of that service?

They are responding by saying they have a multi-million dollar hole in their budget and have to deal with that first. Well, the time to deal with that was when you were passing your budget that included that deficit figure along with a fervent prayer that the province would bail them out. What about the deficit you’re creating in your customers’ budgets due to your failure to provide them with the transport they paid for?

People are paying for taxis, ubers and carpools to get to work, school and essential appointments. They are paying to drive their own cars plus parking and other related costs. Many child care centres charge $1 per minute if you are late picking up your children. I know a woman who has been an average of twenty minutes late every day since the LRT shutdown began. Are they going to compensate her for those charges?

This should not even be a topic for discussion. If you aren’t providing the service that was paid for, it should be automatic that you reimburse the other party. And that should include all reasonable expenses incurred as a result of service disruption. We need a passengers’ Bill of Rights that establishes what people have to be compensated for as well as what that compensation looks like.

Am I the only one who finds it incomprehensible that it’s left up to OC Transpo and their masters at city council to decide whether or not they should do anything to reimburse their customers plus determine when to pay it and how much is due them?