SINGAPORE – Bus operators with routes across the Causeway said a plan to submit advance passenger information to the Immigration and Checkpoints Authority (ICA) could be difficult to implement and might affect business.

The proposed law is part of the Immigration (Amendment) Bill that was introduced for first reading in Parliament on Wednesday by Second Minister for Home Affairs Josephine Teo.

If passed, bus operators will need to submit passenger information before their vehicles reach the Woodlands and Tuas checkpoints. Public bus operators like SBS Transit and Causeway Link will be exempted.

The Ministry of Home Affairs said this advance screening of passengers could weed out undesirable travellers, such as those who pose a safety or security threat.

No-boarding directives (NBDs) are another plan proposed in the Bill. If passed, ICA could issue NBDs to transport operators to bar undesirable individuals from boarding, instead of these people being turned back only upon arrival in Singapore.

Operators who fail to comply may be fined.

Close to 100,000 people cross the Woodlands Checkpoint by bus daily, and the majority are Malaysian workers, said ICA in May this year. It did not provide specific breakdowns for public and private buses.

Mr Joshua Kiong, a sales manager at 707-Inc Great Excursion Travel, said: “We’ll have to stop accepting bookings four hours in advance so we have time to submit passengers’ details to ICA.

“We wouldn’t be able to allow boarding for last-minute passengers, so we’ll lose a lot of business.”

About 30 per cent of his company’s customers book tickets less than six hours before departure. Some also buy tickets in terminals in Malaysia for buses that leave within the hour.

“(With earlier cut-off times), if they arrive at 4pm, they wouldn’t be able to board a bus that leaves at 5pm. Instead, they might have to wait till 10pm,” said the 53-year-old, adding that his company has 25 buses crossing the border daily.

Mr Eugene Soh, 47, who owns Malaysian bus operator City Express, said it collects passenger information for 90 per cent of bookings, which are done online. The remaining bookings at bus terminal counters are not digitally recorded.

Mr Soh, who has been operating cross-border buses for over a decade, said: “For example, there are walk-in customers who buy tickets at 10am for a 10.30am bus… we’ll have to create a system that records their details too.”