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Travelers lament poor airport access in Bali and NTB

The Consumer Protection Foundation (YLPK) Bali chapter said it had conducted surveys of Bali and West Nusa Tenggara (NTB) airport users and found that the respondents lamented poor transportation access between cities and the airports

Fikri Zaki Muhammadi (The Jakarta Post)
Denpasar
Thu, June 26, 2014

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Travelers lament poor airport access in Bali and NTB

T

he Consumer Protection Foundation (YLPK) Bali chapter said it had conducted surveys of Bali and West Nusa Tenggara (NTB) airport users and found that the respondents lamented poor transportation access between cities and the airports.

Working with the Indonesian Consumer Protection Foundation (YLKI) in a series of surveys themed Improving services for airport users, the foundation said that the 300 respondents participating in the surveys complained about the lack of access, citing that improved services should have been the priority rather than having sophisticated technology and luxurious infrastructure for airports.

The two targeted airports were Bali'€™s Ngurah Rai International Airport and Lombok International Airport in West Nusa Tenggara.

For Ngurah Rai, director of the YPLK Bali chapter, I Putu Armaya, said Tuesday that the survey was conducted for five days from June 4 to 8, aiming to facilitate customers filing their complaints as airport users'€™ criticisms to the management were most often not channeled and/or did not receive a response.

According to Armaya, the 300 respondents included both local and foreign travelers. In the results, he said customers were quite satisfied with the service of Ngurah Rai, but slammed the airport management and the Bali administration for not providing a decent mode of transportation to connect the location with the city.

A similar conclusion was obtained from the survey at Lombok airport.

Unlike other airports in the country, such as Soekarno-Hatta International Airport in Jakarta and Adisucipto Airport in Yogyakarta, which have direct bus access provided by state-owned company Damri, Ngurah Rai airport has no such option for customers, meaning the only choice is to use a taxi or private vehicle.

Meanwhile, many tourists lamented that the cabs available at Ngurah Rai charged passengers without using a taximeter.

Armaya criticized the administration, saying that the plan to utilize the Trans Sarbagita bus service to serve airport users had never come to reality.

'€œWe do really hope that the administration isn'€™t simply putting out rhetorical statements, because we believe that this [transportation service] is important to boost Ngurah Rai'€™s services,'€ Armaya said.

'€œMoreover, the international airport has been named the best airport in Indonesia,'€ he added. He emphasized that the 1999 Consumer Protection Law stipulated that customers paid for services, not the technology or infrastructure.

Therefore, Armaya urged the airport management to enter into cooperation with a bus provider to resolve the issue. He added that it also needed to improve its management of the porters available on the site.

Armaya said many tourists reported they were disturbed by porters, who usually charged over-the-top fees to first-timers in Bali, especially foreign travelers. He emphasized that if such a condition continued, the island'€™s image as a tourist destination could be damaged.

The survey was also complemented by a dialog between several airport users and the management.

Separately, co-general manager of state airport operator PT Angkasa Pura I at Ngurah Rai, I Gusti Ngurah Ardita, said the imminent project his side would work on was the transfer of the motorcycle parking area.

Ardita said the airport management had concluded that the location was over capacity and was still investigating details of the planned move to the new location before the Ngurai Rai Customs and Excise Agency, around 1 kilometer before the terminal building.

He said motorcycle riders would be provided with a shuttle bus to reach the terminal building after the move.

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