UTS railway ticket booking app gets bigger patronage base
Posted on: 03/Aug/2016 6:23:14 PM
UTS, the mobile ticket booking app by Southern Railways has seen an increase in its patronage base. Officials say that this is because more people are using it to purchase monthly season tickets or tickets for suburban travel daily. The officials say that despite there still being complaints and suggestions to improve the app, the number of season tickets recorded on the app was 2,34,100 for July, an increase of about 35 per cent from the 1,86,250 booked in June.
Sources, however, say that these figures do not indicate the number of season tickets bought by commuters, but rather the number of trips they made. For instance, a passenger with this ticket makes on an average 55 trips a month. So, the actual number of season tickets sold through the app would be around 4,200. This number is not high considering that over 9 lakh commuters travel in the Chennai suburban network everyday.
Southern Railways recently conducted a massive awareness drive at select station on all sections to help popularise the use of the app. The sections were Chennai to Chengalpattu, Tiruvallur, Gummidipoondi and the Mass Rapid Transit System. They encouraged commuters to download the app and book tickets by offering Wifi.
Users have complained about glitches in the app that was developed by Centre for Rail Information Systems. With the app yet to be made available on the iOS platform, users said that they were unable to transfer the balance amount when they change to a new handset or a new number.
