PoS machines, discount make train travel easier

Chennai: With all suburban train stations in Chennai having PoS machines to accept card payments, coupled with 0.5 per cent  discount on tickets, users find it easier than to struggle for change.

With effect from January 1, ministry of railways has provided a discount of 0.5 per cent for season tickets being purchased through PoS machines over suburban sections.

Users of suburban trains have found this beneficial as change for huge denominations is declined at stations usually and after the crunch caused by demonetisation, everyone is trying to hold on to the Rs 100 notes.

“There have been days earlier than November when I wouldn’t have been able to change Rs 500 notes and that was all that I would have,” said commuter C.L. Ramakrishnan.

“Even though the discount is meagre and just a means to get more people to go digital, it could attract people. Also, all counters at a railway station should have PoS instead of one.”

According to Southern Railway, 28 machines were already in use at 22 locations across Tamil Nadu and Kerala and now, additionally, 40 more machines have been added to these 22 locations. Including the 70 suburban stations in Chennai Suburban system, 138 PoS machines are present at 92 stations in Southern Railway.

Railway officials claim that within a week of installation of PoS machines in the suburban stations, 6.2 per cent of the season ticket passengers have switched to cashless transactions and the cashless transactions have increased from 0.5% to 4.6 per cent.

The second in the Railways plan to go digital, after the UTS mobile app, may find more takers as anyone with a debit card can purchase tickets at the counters.

The UTS app found patronage only among people aware of the app, as it needed a smartphone with internet connection but helped beat the queues.
Further, the railway plans to provide more PoS machines at all reservation offices in a phased manner.