Public transportation is one of the important services in any country. Transportation not only brings a human being to their destination; deeper than that, transporation helps people achieve their goals or dreams, it brings people closer to opportunities and loved ones. It also makes people discover new things especially places. Without public transporation, both citizens and tourists will find it hard to move from one place to another.
Unlike Singapore which has an amazing public transporation system, Philippines has a terrible one. Commuters find it hard to take any public transporation. You can clearly see what I'm talking about during rush hour. The trains and buses are always packed. The traffic makes it a lot worst.
During special occasions especially during long weekend holidays, most of the bus terminals are packed! And the most annoying thing you could experience in a bus terminal is being in a long queu for hours and will later on find out, all bus tickets are sold. Yup, you stood there for nothing. You will be rescheduled for the next day or the next trip.
To avoid this kind of inconvenience on your next vacation in the province, I introduce to you a new service which will help you secure seats to far provinces without the need of going to the bus terminals to book. iWantSeats is a real-time online booking system. This means that you can get instant confirmation of seats directly from the bus operators. They only charge a minimal convenience booking fee of P30 per ticket. You will need the amount due from your booking within 48 hours. Your reservation will automatically expire if they do not receive confirmation of payment from you within this period. You may rebook your trip however, seat availability may change.
There are convenient payment options you can choose from. You can choose to settle your payment via bank deposits (EastWest, BDO, BPI), via Dragonpay, via GCash, SmartMoney or MLhullier ePay. Please note that there can be additional service fees depending on the option you choose to pay.
Booking a seat is easy. Simply follow these steps:
Register or log in at iwantseats.com.ph. Choose the destination, date of your trip and the number of passengers. Enter the name of the passenger(s) and choose your seat(s). Once passengers and seats are added, you may now view your itinerary.
Check your details and review the terms and conditions then procee to payment. Instructions will be given on the mode of payment chosen. Once paid, send your proof of payment to payments@iwantseats.com.ph. Payment must be made within 48 hours before your reservation expires. You will receive a confirmation e-mail with the voucher. Print out your e-ticket.
Go to the terminal 30 minutes before your scheduled trip. Show the e-ticket to the Reservation Officer and present a valid ID. The Reservation Officer will issue a receipt. After receiving the receipt, you're all ready to board your trip.
If you are wondering if iWantSeats allow rebooking or cancellations, yes they do. However, the convenience fee cannot be refunded and refunds for the bus tickets depends on the policy of the bus operator where the booking was made. The specific terms for this policy should be provided and agreed on before payment.
They have disabled the roundtrip booking for operational purposes. You will have to book your departure and arrival trips separately. But hopefully soon, they can enable it again. And though the website is accessible anywhere, there is limited access to international payments. If you're booking from outside the Philippines, call or send them an e-mail so they can assist you.
I have yet to try this service. As of the moment, there are a few destinations from Metro Manila; mostly are trips to Baguio. But there are a good number of trips from provinces like Vigan, Bataan, Baler, etc. Hopefully, they can offer more destinations especially provinces in the South. I believe that this service will help with the tourism of one's province. It will be easier for both local and international tourists to secure a seat especially during peak seasons (ex: summer, festives, etc).
If you want to know more about iWantSeats, visit their website for FAQs or send them a message through their website's contact form. Watch out for new trips coming soon! You may want to like their Facebook page to be updated: www.facebook.com/iwantseats. This new service was first seen/blogged in Dreamers Adventure PH.
DISCLAIMER: This is not a sponsored post. I'm not compensated for this. I do not claim to own any of the photos used in this post. These photos are downloaded from the free HD photo sites. Basic details are from their website and the rest of the words and opinions are my own.
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