
The nation’s FREE newspaper
Toll discounts
by Karen Arukesamy
newsdesk@thesundaily.com
KUALA LUMPUR: Toll discount
of 10% will be given to owners of
private cars and light vehicles who
use the North-South Expressway
and North-South Expressway
Central Link (Elite) Highway
during low-traffic hours from
Jan 1 to end 2010, with additional
discounts during festive seasons.
More incentives are
expected from other highway
concessionaires soon.
Yesterday, the country’s biggest
highway concessionaire, Plus
Expressway Bhd, announced
incentives for travel on the two
highways, the result of negotiations
in recent months with the
government which had been
pushing for toll reductions.
“Plus’s initiative is in line with
the government’s call to give added
value to highway users, especially
during the current economic
situation,” said Works Minister
Datuk Mohd Zin Mohamed (pic)
at the launch
of the Plus
Travel
Incentive
MEMBER AUDIT BUREAU OF CIRCULATIONS (MALAYSIA)
» Fuel cheaper, but bus fares to go up pg6
10% off for travel from midnight-7am
on PLUS and Elite highways
Programme yesterday.
The icing on the incentive
cake is that all Class I (private
cars and light vehicles) highway
users travelling on both highways
between midnight and 7am will
get a 10% toll discount. This could
mean a saving of about RM4 for
the journey from Kuala Lumpur
to Penang. Together with the other
incentives (see table), the savings
would amount to more than 20%.
Mohd Zin said the incentives
went through an indepth study and
evaluation by a Malaysian Highway
Authority (LLM) committee from
May. “This initiative is part of Plus’s
corporate social responsibility
(CSR) and does not require the
government paying compensation,”
he said, adding that previously
the government paid
huge compensation to the
concessionaires to maintain
or reduce toll rates.
He said although the
companies made good
profit, the terms of the
concession agreement called
for compensation to reduce
toll rates or to maintain them
although they were to be
increased.
On the other 20
highways, Mohd Zin
said eight of them
could not reduce their
toll rates for various
reasons: going
through financial
problems, debt
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Wednesday
November 19, 2008
TELLING IT AS IT IS www.sun2surf.com
» Cast under dark cloud pg18
2.9
readers per copy
by Angela Sargunan
newsdesk@thesundaily.com
KUALA LUMPUR: theSun has
achieved a pass-on readership rate
of 2.9 readers per copy (RPC), The
restructuring, newly operating, Nielsen Company’s Malaysia Prime
concession period ending next year 2008 study disclosed yesterday.
and some were under receiver The survey commissioned by
and manager. He did not name the theSun, revealed that the free
eight. paper has been enjoying a pass-on
Mohd Zin hoped the rest will readership rate of 2.9 RPC – just
come up with toll reductions soon. slightly below rival English dailies
He also announced in a New Straits Times (3.0 RPC) and
statement that all toll highway The Star (3.1 RPC).
operators, except one, had agreed The study was conducted to
to make public their concession obtain readers’ perspective and
agreements, confirming a report media consumption habits of
in theSun on Monday that the higher income, affluent individuals
government had declassified the (personal income of over RM2,500)
agreements (see page 2). in the Klang Valley.
LLM director-general Datuk The study also indicated quanti-
Mohamad Razali Othman urged tative justification of theSun’s edi-
other concessionaires to make torial strength and columnist-pull
toll reduction their CSR initiative. with a very strong image among its
He also said that since 1988 mostly affluent readers, of whom
compensation paid to highway 81% spend up to 30 minutes a day
operators was about RM2 billion. with the paper on weekdays.
More than 70% of respondents
strongly agreed that they read
HIGHWAY TOLL
theSun because it is credible, pro-
vides thought provoking, in-depth
REBATES FROM analysis of news and issues which
JANUARY 2009
reflect the concerns of discerning
Malaysians.
S and Elite Socio demographic indicators
INCENTIVES for PLU show that theSun readers have
Highway users strong purchasing power:
Class »
» 10% toll discount for over 90% own at least one
icle s fro m mid nig ht-7am credit card;
1 veh
to Dec 31, »
(effective Jan 1, 2009 80% have a monthly household
2010) incomes exceeding RM5,000;
» Additional 10% toll
discount » over half invest in unit trusts
veh icles fro m mid night- and mutual funds;
for Cla ss 1
7am during Ha ri Ray a Aid ilfitri, » 45% own private residential
epavali and property;
Chinese New Year, De »
sons (Jan 1, 21% own other property;
Christmas festive sea » 12% have offshore invest-
2009 – De c 31, 201 0)
ments; and
ate for
» Additional 5% reb » over half are involved in mak-
users who
electronic toll payment ing business purchase decisions
a month
spend at least RM200 of between RM100,000 and
me mb ers of PLU S Loyalty
and are RM1mil.
e (effect ive Jan 1, 2009).
Programm The study, revealed to 350
gramme
Registration for the pro selected guests from media agen-
starts next month. cies during a presentation at Sime
275,000 COPIES DAILY
Entertainment
Darby Convention Centre, showed
that theSun’s urban readers are
tech-savvy and well-connected
with 90% being frequent internet
users while 55% shop online.
theSun, an award-winning pub-
lication targeted at a niche market
and catering to the affluent readers
specifically in the Klang Valley and
major cities in the peninsula, is the
first read of the day.
Nielsen Media Research execu-
tive director Andrea Douglas said
theSun is significantly the largest
circulated weekday English news-
paper in the Klang Valley.
The study had a sample size
of 888 respondents from top to
middle level managers in business,
government and education as well
as professionals living in the KL/PJ
areas, who answered a 30-minute
online questionnaire, carried out
from February.
Douglas said the methodology
and sampling frame involved the
KL/PJ areas where over 80% of
theSun was distributed and where
online penetration is high.
“While the Nielsen Media Index
is the readership currency for
Malaysia, the coverage does not
reach a sufficiently large enough
sample of affluent Malaysians to
obtain an in-depth analysis into
their newspaper reading behav-
iour,” she said, thus requiring an
additional survey.
“The Media Index also does not
measure readers’ perception of the
newspaper,” she said.
“The 2007 Media Index indicated
97% of Malaysians with incomes
over RM3,000 per month living in
the KL/PJ areas have access to the
internet, so an online sample is
highly representative of the target
audience,” she explained.
theSun distribution channel
manager Joehari Abdul Jabbar said
the paper planned to increase its
print run to 300,000 copies a day,
an additional 25,000 copies, in the
near future.
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