"Five Korea Railroad Corporation Members Purchased Train Tickets Worth 2.9 Billion Won Over 5 Years, Then Canceled 99%"

Audit Board Urges KORAIL to Strengthen Monitoring of Mass Ticket Purchasers and Cancellations
Calls for Improved Standards and Measures to Prevent Inconvenience

Yonhap News

Korea Railroad Corporation (KORAIL) has been found to have lax monitoring of passengers who purchase a large number of tickets through its website and then cancel them, causing inconvenience. In particular, five individuals who canceled tickets totaling over 100 million KRW had purchased tickets worth 2.93 billion KRW over the past five years and canceled 99.2% of them, amounting to 2.908 billion KRW, but the railroad corporation was completely unaware of this.

On the 20th, the Board of Audit and Inspection (BAI) disclosed the results of its regular audit and notified KORAIL to strengthen monitoring of passengers who purchase and cancel large volumes of railroad tickets, to reasonably supplement the standards, and to prepare appropriate improvement measures.

According to the BAI, KORAIL monitors passengers who purchase and then cancel large volumes of tickets and takes measures such as membership withdrawal. However, it was confirmed that members who purchased tickets through the KORAIL website rather than the KORAIL Talk app, premium members, those who cancel on the day of travel, or those who cancel one day prior were excluded from monitoring.

As a result, among 139 customers with annual cancellation amounts exceeding 10 million KRW and cancellation rates over 95%, only 16 were detected through monitoring, while the remaining 123 (88.5%) were not detected.

Yonhap News

Furthermore, KORAIL signed purchase contracts for 250,000 concrete sleepers with Company A in 2022 and 2023 for maintenance and improvement, brought them to the site, and installed them on the tracks. However, it was revealed that the actual delivery was made by a different company, not Company A, and KORAIL knowingly overlooked this.

During the audit period, a sample inspection of 1,990 curved sleepers delivered by Company A found that 13% (259 units) of the inspected sleepers were substandard, raising concerns about the safety of train operations.

The BAI stated, "Appropriate measures such as restricting bidding eligibility will be taken against Company A, which violated the direct production obligation, and all substandard sleepers will be replaced. We have also notified KORAIL to prepare appropriate measures." It added, "Disciplinary actions were taken against five related personnel who improperly handled delivery inspections, and one person was given a warning."

Additionally, the BAI reviewed the disciplinary actions for 186 KORAIL employees caught for drunk driving from January 2021 to April 2024 and found that 37 and 44 of them, respectively, were promoted or received commendations without any disciplinary action. There were also cases where train operators drove trains on the same day they were caught for drunk driving.

Moreover, 260 KORAIL employees who took sick leave or applied for union activities during working hours were found to have traveled abroad or visited racetracks.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.