Group Results and Dividends
The Board of Directors announces that the audited consolidated profit for the year ended 30th June, 1989 after transfer to the Development Fund in accordance with the Profit Control Scheme amounted to $59.63 million compared with $48.63 million for the previous year.
The Directors will recommend to shareholders at the forthcoming ordinary yearly meeting to be held on 8th December, 1989 the payment of a final dividend of 33 cents per share. This, together with the first interim dividend of 21 cents per share, a special dividend of 5 cents per share and a second interim dividend of 18 cents per share already paid, will make a total dividend for the year of 77 cents per share compared with 77 cents per share for the previous year.
Result of Bus Operation
Bus operating profits decreased from $69.65 million in 1988 to $62.18 million in 1989. In accordance with the Profit Control Scheme, the sum of $3.86 million was transferred to the Development Fund.
Traffic Activities
The number of passengers carried during the year under review decreased by 2.7 per cent from 320.7 million to 312.0 million whilst kilometres operated decreased from 54.6 million to 51.0 million.
The general shortage of labour continued to hamper the Company in the recruitment of drivers and serious road congestion continued to affect the reliability of our services. Both of these features contributed to the reduction in the number of kilometres operated.
Further service improvements were implemented under the Route Development Programme. New Route 18 was introduced between North Point and West Point and frequencies were adjusted on several existing routes to cater for increases or decreases in demand.
Bus Fleet
After further rationalisation, the Company's fleet at 30th June, 1989 stood at 983 buses with a total carrying capacity of 114,766. A further forty-six three-axle high-capacity double-decker buses were purchased during the year under review and most of these have now entered service to improve the level of service provided, particularly in Southern District.
Facilities For Passengers
New designs for bus shelters are under examination to find the most cost-effective design.
The "hotline" telephone enquiry service received over 83,000 calls during the year.
Computer System
Significant progress was achieved with the introduction of a computer system during the year. The system hardware has been installed and programmes are being written to enable existing manual methods of producing management information to be replaced by the computer system.
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