Deposit and a minimum of 16 trips for free transport vouchers

The free access to public rail transport services announced by the Government will come into force on September 1, as approved by the Council of Ministers at its last meeting before the summer holidays.

Thomas Osborne
Thomas Osborne
02 August 2022 Tuesday 00:58
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Deposit and a minimum of 16 trips for free transport vouchers

The free access to public rail transport services announced by the Government will come into force on September 1, as approved by the Council of Ministers at its last meeting before the summer holidays. It will apply to public services provided by Renfe such as commuter trains; medium distance routes, Avant and metric gauge networks. Also to some continuous gauge commercial services that do not have alternative public service agreements. In total, the budget allocated by the Ministry of Transport for this aid amounts to 201 million euros.

In the design of access to these benefits, "easiness" has prevailed, according to sources from the Ministry of Transport. For this reason, to benefit from the aid of the Government, those interested must acquire a bond valid between September 1 and December 31 for which they will have to pay a deposit that will be recovered at the end of the period provided that they have made a minimum of 16 trips in the total of 4 months.

In the case of suburban services, this deposit will be 10 euros, in the case of medium and long-distance trains, 20 euros. Avant services will have a direct reduction of 50%. And for regular users of AVE services without a public provision alternative and whose travel time is less than 100 minutes, it will design a special bonus that will reduce the cost by 50%.

Although the final details are yet to be defined, from the Ministry of Transport they assure that "almost certainly" the vouchers will be issued as personalized titles that cannot be shared.

In the field of Transport, in turn, the mandatory covid measures for airport and company managers are eliminated (it does not affect the mandatory use of masks) and an aid of 150 million is approved so that Aena advances in the implementation of measures of identification of non-community passengers that the European Union requires at customs and that could aggravate the long waits at the entrances to the country that are taking place this summer.

On the other hand, the Council of Ministers has also approved a royal decree to protect the most vulnerable entrepreneurs such as self-employed carriers and avoid loss-making work. Specifically, the new regulations establish the obligation to make written contracts with the effective carrier, the one that finally performs the service, and in these contracts it will be required that the real cost of the service is reflected.

In turn, the royal decree that includes the drafting of a code of good practices with which it is sought to regulate the number of intermediaries in the transport sector and reduce those that, without contributing activity, increase the costs that will be reviewed after six months to design a more defined regulation on subcontracting. The text includes, in turn, an extension of 450 million in direct aid per vehicle that now also extends to urban buses.