Of 28 New Premium P2P Routes, Only 6 Bus Companies Approved for 11 Routes by LTFRB

In March, the Land Transportation Franchising and Regulatory Board (LTFRB) opened up 28 new Premium Point-to-Point (P2P) Bus Service routes for prospective transport companies to apply for through 16 franchise packages. Of the 38 bus companies that applied for the 28 routes, only six were deemed as "qualified" by the LTFRB for 11 specific routes while the rest were "failed" by the agency.

Of the 16 franchise packages for the Premium P2P  Bus Service that opened, the only ones that had qualified operators which met the guidelines set by the agency were the following:

Package 2 (Balagtas, Bulacan – North EDSA; Pandi, Bulacan – North EDSA; Plaridel, Bulacan – North EDSA) - HM Transport

Package 3 (Calamba, Laguna – Makati; Calamba, Laguna – BGC/Fort Bonifacio, Taguig City; Calamba, Laguna – Lawton) - Saint Rose Transit

Package 4 (NAIA/Parañaque Integrated Terminal Exchange – Baguio) - Pangasinan Solid North Transit

Package 14 (Batangas City – Ortigas; Batangas City – Parañaque Integrated Terminal Exchange) - RRCG Transport System and Alps The Bus

Package 16 (Lipa, Batangas – Ortigas; Lipa, Batangas – Parañaque Integrated Terminal Exchange) - Alps The Bus

Of the 11 other franchise packages, most of the applying operators were disqualified for various reasons, from failing to comply with the requirements set by the LTFRB to applying for only one of the three routes as set forth in the packaged applied for.

Meanwhile, approval for packages 6 to 9--which has routes to and from the cities of Cebu and Iloilo--have been endorsed to the directors of the respective LTFRB regional offices.

Of note, applicants for packages 10 and 11 were not posted publicly online by the agency so either these are still under deliberation by the LTFRB or it has not received applications for the Iloilo City – Caticlan and Iloilo City – Kalibo Airport routes.