geedee

Working from home.... it's pretty easy to do these days with email. I have a brilliant little app called Team Viewer which I can actually control the office computer!

I will of course still need to travel in, but not nearly as much (hopefully!)

geedee

Facebook contact reported THREE HOURS to get into S'pore this morning, leaving home around 0800.

Just looked at the camera expecting a jam to get back out (as usual) and there isn't one.... but there is to get IN to S'pore. What's up with that??? Are there more stringent entry requirements or something? Haven't been over for a while....

Singmom

Geedee,

That is just unbelievable... But I'm not surprise given how long the queue was.
And indeed there was hardly any traffic coming back. Where have all the people gone!? Really a mystery...!

Singmom

I am mind-boggled (and outraged) by the news that effective August 1, LTA will raise VEP for foreign cars to $35/day from $20... That's 75% increase!!

I guess this is Singapore's answer to reduce congestion at checkpoints... Sigh...

geedee

Bloody hell... just when I was thinking of selling my kidney and getting a car!

They really are trying to nip this "work in S'pore, live in Nusajaya" thing in the bud, aren't they?

There is still no sign of queues reducing, so far as I've noticed. And it is all because of closed booths. Never a problem in Malaysia.

Eus

It is still all about timing, both bikes and cars. Even early Monday (4.50 in the morning last Monday) cars is very busy and bikes are still very quiet (5.15 bikes busy as well).

All the more reason to buy a Singapore plated motorbike and start early and go home early (like I do, despite complaints from my boss).

geedee

I have a S'pore plate bike.... I start late (leave home 0900 ish) and leave before 1600 (when I go in... working a lot more from home now!). I've noticed that even at these times the queues are building... lots of people with the same idea?

One Immigration Officer did tell me that the procedure at Woodlands has changed since the "incursions". It now takes longer and so more people are using Tuas.... that may be true.....

Eus

Ah, that makes sense because Tuas seems more busy. I still leave just after 5 on the bike (say 5.10 to 5.15) and then the border is OK. After that it is getting very busy at the Singapore side.

Afternoon around 16.30 when I normally arrive at the border it is still OK but gets very busy after that till late at night (the B-King even starts overheating so I turn the engine off, and that is not fun pushing it up the hill).

Cars starts getting busier later, maybe 15 to 30 mins at the most.

I still have a Singapore car but that won't be for much longer, so I will increase my dayrate to compensate for the cost when I start driving my Malaysian car across.

bakedbean

Geedee has got his head screwed on. Leave home late, leave work early. Way to go

Eus

I agree, I have resigned from my staff job and will be contracting/consulting

geedee

Not really.... I leave the office early, but that's not the end of work!

Having said that I missed my deadline today, unavoidable, so am stuck in town until the jam dies down!

Eus

Still at work, meetings till midnight today and tomorrow, then back to "normalish"

geedee

Bet you're tele-conferencing with London... "I say, we're awake and so should you be!"

I left the office at 8pm because the queue of bikes looked quite small on the camera.... got home at 10, nearly an hour to get through S'pre border because 4 out of 8 of the auto-booths for bikes were "malfunctioning".

Twats.

baiano27

I came back one Sunday and there were so many booths open Singapore side. I queried that with the lady behind the counter and she seemed to be surprised there are peak times when so many are not open. She replied straight away so appeared to be honest in what she was saying (she might be new!). She mentioned there were 3 groups of employees who rotate the shifts so I have come to the conclusion that the reason there are less on the booth during the peak times is because half of the group have to go outside to sort out traffic.

So if everyone queued nicely then I reckon more booths would be open!!

To be honest I am hoping the increase in VEP convince more onto public transport which if they increased the number of buses isn't actually that bad as I've had to jump on one a few times and avoided the jams.

My concern now is that Malaysia will retaliate and increase the impending VEP for Singapore cars coming to Malaysia. At the moment it looks like it will cost me SGD80 a month but now they may increase more.

The idiots who jumped the barrier have definitely made things more difficult for everyone as that is the reason for the massive increase in cars at Tuas.

bakedbean

You are psychic

You guys won't want to hear this. In today's papers, states that the Malaysian government is mulling over a Johor proposal to impose a charge on foreign vehicles coming into Malaysia. Oh dear. You can read more here:
http://www.straitstimes.com/news/asi...es-entering-bo