New rail website, app soon to help book tickets faster

The railways is set to launch a revamped website and new Android-based Indian Railways Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) mobile App to ensure faster and easier ticket-booking and help passengers plan their travel better. The new website will be passenger-friendly, clutter-free with easier log-in and navigation and will not have the problem of getting timed out during booking of a ticket.

The state-run transporter aims to gather a larger chunk of business through its new website and mobile App from other travel websites and Apps.
The new features being introduced include display of confirmed tickets and dates to help plan journey by relying on data analytics and also curb misuse of facilities such as Tatkal.

The transporter has also plans to start a mechanism to send SMS alerts to travellers about arrival and departure of trains on a real-time basis.
Text alerts will also be sent to passengers mobile phones during the journey about any delay, cause of delay and the time the train will take to reach the next station and its final destination. The new features will be added with the help of Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) to inform travellers on exact location of the train by using satellites.

“This will help anyone to track a train’s location on a real-time basis,” said an official, adding that at present local station officials feed the train’s arrival and departure time at that particular location which is often being manipulated to avoid punishment for late running.

A railway official admits that other travel websites at present are much easier to navigate. Another official pointed out that the issue of coordination between IRCTC and Centre for Railway Information Systems (CRIS), an IT arm of the railways, is also being resolved.

News Source: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/