Safe ePayments Booster 2 – Indian Railways Go India Card

            Another step towards LessCash society.

            For the last one month or so, Indian Railways Go India Card was in the testing stage. Northern Railways was the chosen division for the test phase.

Minister of Railways, Shri S.D.Sadananda Gowda formally launched the Go India Card at a function in Mumbai on 13th August.

GO India Card is a pan India smart card to enable passengers to pay for tickets for long distance reserved, unreserved, and suburban journeys as a pilot project.

            The chief features of Go India Smart Card are:

• It can be used a nominated UTS counters and Automatic Ticket Vending Machines (ATVMs) and nominated PRS counters for reserved tickets
• It is a contact-less smart card: no need to swipe or insert into a slot.
• The pilot project to be implemented on the following two sectors:

a)    New Delhi – Howrah sector at 6 stations.: New Delhi, Kanpur, Allahabad, Dhanbad, Asansol, Howrah

b)   New Delhi – Mumbai sector at 6 stations: New Delhi, Kota, Vadodara, Ratlam, Surat, Mumbai Central.

• Initially, the card can be issued by paying Rs. 70/- where passenger can get Rs. 20/- balance. After that the card can be recharged for Rs. 20/- or in multiples of Rs. 50/- up to Rs. 5000/-. Maximum limit can be Rs. 10,000/-.
• Go-India smart card has lifetime validity.
• Go India Smart Card can be utilized to for hassle-free purchase of all modes of rail tickets in the pilot sectors.
• Go-India Smart Card will be used for Indian Railway application i.e. Unreserved Ticketing System (UTS), Passenger Reservation System (PRS) and Retiring Room (RR) counters and existing Automatic Ticket Vending Machines (ATVM)s. 

• In the future, Go India Smart Card will be rolled out to all parts of India.

• Go-India smart card will be a separate card from existing ATVM smart card. Go-India smart card can be used across UTS, PRS, RR and existing ATVM of Indian Railway but existing ATVM smart card can be used o­nly across ATVMs of that region. 
• Go-India smart card is interoperable across various applications and UTS thin clients can work in disconnected mode for 3 days hence issuance of duplicate card will be allowed o­nly after 3 days i.e. 3 days excluding the day to mark card for duplicate.
• Validity of Go-India smart card will unlimited but, if no transaction are done within 6 months on Go-India smart card then smart card will be temporary deactivated which can be activated again by paying Rs. 50/- as activation charge. 
• At the time of issuance/recharge of Go-India smart card, actual amount will be top-up o­n smart card and discount will be given on face value of UTS tickets instead of existing bonus logic used for ATVM smart card. 
• Currently, passengers are allowed to take non-concessional journey ticket, platform ticket and renew non-concessional season ticket through ATVM. 
• However, there is no bonus advantage given on renewal of season ticket and journey tickets in non-suburban section beyond 150 KMs through ATVM kiosks.
• On  Go-India Smart card at ATVMs/UTS counters, instead of giving bonus advantage, discount (5%) will be given on ticket face value and passenger can take non-concessional season ticket through UTS counters also but as per policy, passenger will get discount o­n suburban journey ticket, non-suburban journey ticket upto 150 KMs, platform ticket o­nly, BPT ticket, miscellaneous ticket and money receipts will not be allowed through Go-India smart card. 
• In case of PRS/RR tickets, there is no bonus/discount advantage given at the time of booking and during booking/issuance of ticket, ticket fare/amount will be directly debit from the Go-India smart card.
• Tuning into the life-style changes of the public, the Go-India Smart card would afford rail passengers advantages like avoiding problems of Coin Change and save valuable passenger time (queue time).  

‘Go India’ Rail Smart Card to be finally live. A competitor to eRail Wallet!!

Will the ‘Go India’ Rail Smart Card, be a competitor for IRCTC eRail Wallet. Well, only time will tell.

            The ‘Go India’ smart card ticket project was announced in the Railway Budget 2011-12 by Ms.Mamta Banerjee.

            Railways are in the final stages of launching a pilot run, hopefully by this year end. A pilot run is necessary to stabilize the operational part and to minimize customer complaints  in the final rollout.

The IT arm of the Indian Railways i.e ‘The Centre for Railway Information System (CRIS)’, is in the process of fine-tuning the software for the Smart Card.

In the pilot run, the Smart Cards can be used to buy tickets on the busy Delhi-Howrah and Delhi-Mumbai routes. Naturally, the Smart Cards can also be used on the Kolkata Metro, as the Railway minister belongs to West Bengal. However, Kolkata Metro will be covered in the second phase.

The pilot run is scheduled for one year, and depending on the response, this can be rolled-out Pan India.

As per the current thought process, through the ‘Go India’ Rail Smart Card, one can book reserved and unreserved tickets rail ticket booking counters, automatic ticketing vending machines (ATVM) and also through the Internet.

            All major stations like Kanpur, Allahabad and Dhanbad in Delhi-Howrah route and Baroda and Surat in Delhi-Mumbai sector will have facilities for using Go-India card.

            The agreement with a nationalized bank will be shortly signed, to make ‘Go India’ Rail Smart Card operational. Which nationalized bank will have the tie-up with Indian railways? My choice is State Bank of India or Union Bank of India.

            The ‘Go India’ Rail Smart Card, will be a semi-closed eWallet.

            As of now, the major difference visible between ‘Go India’ Rail Smart Card and IRCTC eRail Wallet, is that the eRail Wallet can only be used on IRCTC website, whereas the ‘Go India’ Rail Smart Card can be used offline as well as online.

            The more the merrier, as the customers will be ultimate beneficiaries.

            Re-disseminated by Prashant N. Banker by daytime, Blogger by night.