* Last year CAG has compared the fares of seats/ berths provided by the trains and buses for the equivalent services/facilities in many routes and indicated that the cost of AC fares in trains are much higher than the cost of AC fares in buses on all the routes. It was concluded that this was due to higher cost of inputs of IR i.e. inefficient utilisation of resources by IR. On the other hand in case of non ac seats/berths, fare of IR was a small fraction of the cost of equivalent bus seats/berths. CAG recommended to increase fares of non ac classes.
* But this year CAG is recommending increase of ac class I,II & non ac first class fares to...
more... recover the cost. And if IR follow the CAG recommendation, the number of paxs in these classes shall fall drastically leading to higher losses and CAG shall again blameIR!! Selling railway seats is a game of marketing and not a simple calculation deduced from the book of accounts.
* ACII coach costs a bit lesser than ACIII coach, haulage cost is also a bit lesser than ACIII (lesser weight), cost of supplying bedrolls is also lesser
Revenue Collection per coach for ADI-Delhi Express train is
ACII- 54 berths x 1749/- =95,850/-
ACIII-72 berths x 1210/- = 88,128/-
ACI- 24 berths x 3020/- = 72,480/-
Revenue Collection per coach for ADI-Delhi SF train is
ACII- 54 berths x 1794/- =96,876/-
ACIII-72 berths x 1255/- = 90,360/-
ACI- 24 berths x 3054/- = 73,320/-
Above indicates that ACII should be most profitable class with revenue more than ACIII coach and expenditure lesser than ACIII coach. ACI is the most loss making class.
* Either the methodology of profit/loss calculation is not correct or the occupancy rates of the ACII class is much lower as compared to ACIII. Or the fact that a large number of non paying travellers in ACII coaches have not been accounted. If ACII coach is not there, the non paying pax in ACII will go in the ACIII coach and ACIII too may no long remain that profitable!