I had bought two tickets for the ‘Gunung Raya’ express bus service at Counter 38-39 at the Puduaya bus terminal in Kuala Lumpur. Paid RM31 each for a one-way journey to Butterworth today at 8am.

One would expect fairly good treatment from a bus company that goes by a tagline ‘It’s plain simple’. But, this is far from the truth.

We are still sitting in the bus as I write this email. It is 9.20 am. And we have a train to Bangkok to catch at 2 pm. Which we won't be in time for. Chances are we will miss the train, the start of our vacation due to inefficiency by a stupid bus company that's allowed to operate.

At 7.30am, the Gunung Raya counter was still closed. At 7.45 am, upon checking at the counter, we were told the bus was cancelled. We were sent to Platform 23 to board an alternative bus service, Alisan bearing bus registration number BKG 8306 .

Which was nothing what the lady at the Gunung Raya counter promised. On top of that, we were treated rudely and shouted at by the bus attendant and the lady at the counter when we asked when the bus will depart.

To add salt to injury ,the bus driver (an guy with a yellow and blue T-shirt) even told us even he doesn't know what time we will depart from Puduraya!

When we called Gunung Raya, the lady at the counter told us they will refund the cash, but if we want to get to Butterworth at all, to shut up. Finally, we left at 9.25 am, an hour and 25 minutes later than promised.

We are disappointed at the way we were treated. We paid good money. We are Malaysians. So what the hell happened to good consumerism? Or at least the courtesy to be nice? It’s no point the government barking about Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) when at the ground level, ordinary Malaysians are treated poorly.

The way things get done in Puduraya, one of the oldest bus hubs in Malaysia is shocking. So-called ‘agents’ run the show and this is a surprise coming from a reputable bus company.

If the government wants a clean country, try cleaning up from below first. But then again, I guess the prime minister and the transport minister don't take the bus anywhere, huh?

A Google search on ‘Alisan’ and ‘Gunung Raya’ did not provide an email address for me to copy this email to. Interestingly, I learnt that both bus companies are Singapore- based!