- City Fajr Shuruq Duhr Asr Magrib Isha
- Dubai 04:22 05:41 12:19 15:46 18:52 20:11
It’s not just the school fees that will create a dent in your wallet this academic year. Parents will now have to shell out more for their child’s school transportation even as, ironically, Dubai’s Enoc/Eppco announced a 20-fils reduction in diesel price just hours ago.
In an e-mailed circular sent out to the students of parents of Dubai’s Winchester School, which is part of the Dubai-based Gems group, parents were informed about a new fee structure for their kids’ transportation.
The service for the school is provided by School Transport Services (STS), and the hike isn’t limited to Winchester school but across a wide section of Dubai’s schools that STS caters to. See below for a list of 32 schools that STS provides transportation for.
“During the last few years, we have taken various measures to ensure that we provide the safest transportation and this has helped us to emerge as a world leader in school transportation,” highlighted the e-mailed message.
It then listed out all the safety points that they have had on offer until now – GPS tracking devices, electronic attendance, video surveillance system, constant monitoring of the buses, panic button, installation of guardian cards, and mobile text alerts for parents.
“In addition to the huge expenditure incurred to introduce all the above features, reduction of seats in the buses as per RTA specifications, there has also been a steep increase in the cost of buses and fuel; hence it has become necessary for us to have a marginal increase in the transport fees.”
A table highlighting the new fee structure and its three-term break-up was listed at the end.
For Winchester school, the annual fee for students residing in the Gardens and Discovery Gardens will be Dh3,100, while students residing in Sharjah will have to shell out Dh5,600 to avail of the bus transport.
The new transport fees will be effective from September 2013.
An STS official confirmed the news to Emirates24|7. “We haven’t increased fees in two years,” he explained.
“It will work out to Dh20 per month.” That would work out to an additional D200 to Dh250 per child, per year for most parents.
The schools that STS provides transportation for are:
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