In a step to provide respite to passengers and keeping up with the technology, Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation (MSRTC) has introduced the Android ETM (Electronic Ticketing Machine) that will allow passengers to make payments for tickets through their mobile payment service applications like GPay, PhonePe and others. The android based POS (Point of Sale) machine also has the facility to swipe cards. A total of 1086 such machines have been received at Nagpur Division that will be distributed to various bus stations. The introduction of these machines will make a big impact on tickets in general, as passengers and the bus conductors will not have to worry about carrying small denominations or loose change during their journey. On many occasions, bus conductors fail to return the appropriate amount to the passengers due to unavailability of small denominations and this provokes an argument between the passengers and the conductors of MSRTC. It was also observed that passengers and conductor had to obtain change from hoteilers or food vendors during their halts on the respective routes.

 

Speaking on the development, Gautam Shende, Depot Manager, Ganeshpeth Bus Stand stated that this is a big step in the ticketing department of MSRTC. All the records will now be available online and at the click of a button, the conductors can account the journey details. This will also implement transparency since passengers will now pay the exact amount of ticket charge and the travellers will not have be on the receiving end to wait for their change. Also, since almost everyone today has Android based mobile phones, it will soon become the preffered payment method among travellers. Barring a few senior citizens who still use key based mobiles, all shall migrate to this mode of payment.