The transport minister says he will consider introducing fines for rail operators who miss stops.
Humza Yousaf is looking at new financial penalties after Fife MSPs told him commuters are “horrified” at levels of stop-skipping in the area.
Alex Rowley, the Labour MSP, said passengers have been left waiting for an hour on platforms because of failures to honour commitments to stop at certain stations.
Calling for the railway to be nationalised, Mr Rowley said: “People have been patient, but they have waited long enough. We need action.”
The Labour MSP added: “Masses of rail users in Fife are horrified at the service that they are getting.”
Mark Ruskell, for the Scottish Greens, demanded the Scottish Government ends the discrepancy in which ScotRail is not fined for skipping stops because it is only treated as a “partial cancellation”.
“Does the minister agree that skip-stopping must be identified in the new franchise and that financial penalties need to be applied to it?” he said.
Mr Yousaf said he will “reflect on Mark Ruskell’s point when considering future franchises”, which opens the way for specific fines for missing out stops.
He added stop-skipping “counts as a public performance measure failure” for which ScotRail is “held to account”.
Mr Yousaf said: “When I became the transport minister, I told ScotRail that I expected it to minimise the skipping of stops, particularly during peak hours.
“That has happened, but it is clear that the autumn and winter months have been challenging for ScotRail, and that is unwelcome.”
ScotRail say stops are skipped on a “tiny number of occasions” and are only deployed to protect large numbers of peak service passengers from delays.
