The Major Pilferages Killing Your Intercity Bus Company—and How to Stop Them
The Silent Killer in Your Business
Every year, your small to medium intercity bus company is losing an estimated 20 to 50 million FCFA because of internal theft—what we call pilferage. That’s money you could use to buy a new bus, open another terminal, or hire and train better staff. But instead, it quietly disappears into the hands of employees.
As an intercity transport company owner, chances are you already suspect that money is leaking. You may have tried everything—being present all the time, installing CCTV cameras, or hiring family members to manage operations—but you still have that gut feeling: “They’re stealing from me, but I can’t prove it.”
Now, what if I told you there’s a smarter way to trace every coin in your business—without being there 24/7?
Oh yes—and that’s the purpose of this write-up.
This isn’t some recycled theory from a textbook. It’s based on real insights from a group of transport innovation experts who worked with Oasis Travels, an intercity bus company in Cameroon, for 3 months.
The goal of that partnership was simple:
- Estimate how much revenue is lost to employee pilferage.
- Design a cost-effective way to fix it—without adding more stress, cost, or staff.
If these goals match what you want for your company, keep reading. What you’ll learn here could help you save millions every single year.
Why You Can’t Stop Revenue Leakages (Yet)
When you started, your business probably had just 1–3 terminals, a few buses, and a small team. You could be present at most stations, check the books yourself, and watch operations closely.
But then you grew.
More buses. More routes. More passengers. More staff. And with that growth, things started slipping through the cracks. You couldn’t be everywhere at once anymore—and your team knew it. That’s when the stealing began. From bookings to luggage to parcels, money started disappearing.
Here’s the problem: you’re still running your business the same way you did when it was small.
As your company grows, it becomes harder to track everything manually. Without the right systems in place, pilferage becomes part of the culture. And the sad reality is this:
As your business grows, so does your employees’ opportunity to steal.
Now think about this honestly:
With the small salaries you’re paying, how do you think your employees are surviving?
They’re not living on just their paycheck. They’re topping up their income by stealing from your business—and doing it with a smile on their face.
Your best shot to stop this is by having a traceability system that tracks every coin in your business without you being there 24/7.
Before we introduce you to the Arctangent CRM & Traceability System, let’s break down the three major categories of pilferage, their sources, and what you can do to stop them.
The 3 Major Types of Pilferages, Their sources and How You Can Intervene
To keep things clear, we’ll group employee theft into three categories based on how the money is stolen:
- Revenue Leakages
- Price Hikes
- System Abuse
We’ll also share specific interventions for each category.
1. Revenue Leakages
This type of pilferage accounts for roughly 63% of total losses. Employees collect the right amount from customers, deduct a portion, and report the rest. Common sources include:
- Road Sales Pilferage
Drivers pick up passengers along the route and pocket the fare, especially when buses don’t leave the terminal at full capacity. - Luggage Pilferage
Passengers pay for extra luggage, but there’s no way to verify the amount collected. The loader reports what they want. - Parcel Pilferage
Staff collect the correct amount from customers. Issue the right amount on the receipt but report less in financial records.
- Road Sales Pilferage
Example: In one of our background investigations with Oasis Travels, a cashier collected 1,500 FCFA and issued a correct receipt, but only entered 1,000 FCFA into the system. The customer, who received a digital SMS receipt, reported the fraud immediately. Without that message, the theft would have gone unnoticed.
Revenue Leakages Intervention:
Use an incentivised closed-loop feedback system where customers can report inconsistencies directly. This system process makes it harder for staff to underreport transactions as they are aware administration is monitoring every transaction through the eyes of the customers.
2. Price Hikes
This category involves staff inflating costs for parts, services, or general company expenses. It thrives where the validator lacks domain expertise. This form of pilferage accounts for roughly 25%.
- Maintenance Pilferage
Technicians inflate repair costs or add fake maintenance tasks, knowing the owner can’t verify mechanical details. - General Procurement
These Includes inflated costs for office equipment, fuel, renovations, etc. Employees negotiate price hikes with suppliers and share the pilferage amount.
Price Hikes Intervention:
Use a requisition and validation system where:
- The person requesting funds ≠ the person approving
- Validators can view historical pricing data
- The system flags outlier amounts automatically
This setup makes it harder for inflated requests to pass unchecked.
3. System Abuse
Rather than underreporting or price inflation, this pilferage involves exploiting loopholes in your processes and systems. This form of pilferage accounts for roughly 10%.
- Booking Pilferage
Booking agents (cashiers) collect money but register the ticket as FREE. These free tickets are hard to track, especially in manual or poorly structured systems.
System Abuse Intervention:
Automate sensitive processes. Automation eliminates manual abuse.
For example:
- FREE tickets are automatically validated by the system only after a customer travels X times.
- Reschedules happen only through the system after meeting specific policy criteria.
Guidelines on How To Stop Pilferage Even as You Grow
The pilferage problem is one of the biggest challenges facing intercity bus companies today. Some companies attempt to fight it with partial systems, more staff, or heavy surveillance. Most of those methods only work short-term or create new issues.
But there’s a better approach.
We found that the most successful interventions share 4 powerful traits. These traits are now the pillars of the Arctangent CRM & Traceability System:
- Efficient Business Processes – Your company’s core processes should run like a finely tuned engine, eliminating inefficiencies and wasted resources.
- Unified Business Data – All critical data should be accessible in one central unified location for faster, smarter decision-making.
- High-Performing Employees – Your staff should be trained and structured like an elite unit, ensuring precision and efficiency in operations.
- Decision Support Copilot – With the first three pillars in place, you need an AI-driven system that acts as a trusted advisor, offering real-time insights to optimise your business.
How to Get Started ?
Now that you understand how damaging employee pilferage is damaging the growth of your intercity bus transportation company, there’s one key truth you need to recognise:
Knowledge alone won’t transform your business.
If knowledge were enough, transportation and logistics professors would be the most successful intercity bus business owners. But they aren’t. The real key is execution.
Results = Knowledge (4 Key Pillars) X Execution
From experience, most intercity bus owners struggle with execution. Not because they aren’t intelligent, but because testing different strategies can be costly, time-consuming, and risky if done without expert guidance.
That’s exactly why we created the Transport Innovation Hub—a private community for forward-thinking intercity bus operators who want to:
- Discover how to stop revenue leakage without being physically present 24/7
- Learn simple systems to trace every franc—without adding new overhead
- Access tools and templates built by transport innovation experts
- See real case studies from bus companies already recovering millions
Interested?
We’re opening up a few spots for qualified operators this month.
Click HERE and apply to see if you qualify.
Note: This isn’t for everyone. It’s built for owners who are ready to run a professional, scalable bus business—not just survive
Author: Ivo Kubam
Date: 19-06-2025
Boreze Team