Railways launches QR code scanners for unreserved ticket holders amid festival rush

Hyderabad: With an approximate 3.5 lakh people travelling for the festival season, South Central Railway has started a QR code scanner for the passengers of unreserved tickets.

UTS mobile app

To facilitate the passengers and ensure convenient purchasing of unreserved tickets, South Central Railway introduced the ‘UTS’ mobile application.

Since its inception, the app has been receiving positive responses from rail users, and the number of passengers utilising the app is steadily increasing.

The UTS app is a big leap in the modern ticketing system and a boon to the huge segment of passengers on Indian Railways who travel on unreserved tickets. The zone has been taking several initiatives to sensitise the rail users regarding the UTS mobile APP and to increase the share of unreserved tickets booked through the mobile app.

QR codes will be printed on jackets

In this direction, SCR has introduced a new initiative to promote the purchase of tickets through the UTS mobile APP at the station areas in view of the expected increase of rush in the ensuing festive season.

Accordingly, retro reflective jackets have been procured on which QR code stickers are printed on the back side for purchasing unreserved tickets by scanning the same through the UTS APP or Rail One APP.

These jackets will be put on by the persons who are deployed to promote the UTS mobile APP in the high footfall areas like station concourse area, entry/exit gates, outside the ticket counters etc.

The rail users can scan the QR code present on the back of the jacket with their mobile application of UTS or Rail One.

The staff will guide them regarding the usage of the application and the benefits of purchasing tickets through the UTS app. This interactive and on-ground approach will help in creating awareness among passengers about the app’s user-friendly features, particularly QR code-based ticketing, which contributes to reducing queues at ticket counters and encourages cashless, digital transactions.

Facility covers all six major divisions

This facility has been introduced in major stations of the Zone like Secunderabad, Kacheguda, Vijayawada, Guntur, Guntakal, Tirupati, Nanded, etc, covering all six divisions of the Zone.

The distance restrictions imposed initially for the purchase of general tickets have been relaxed and the rail users can now purchase the tickets from any location 5 meters away from the station premises and the railway track.

In simple terms, the passenger can book their tickets (both journey/platform tickets) from their home itself and board the train without standing in long queues for purchasing the Unreserved Tickets. The Passengers who are already in the station concourse area can purchase the tickets by scanning this QR code.

Bonus incentives

The UTS App provides multilingual support and enables passengers to purchase unreserved journey tickets, platform and season tickets through their mobile as per their convenience without the hassle of waiting in long queues at the booking counters.

In line with the digital India initiative, the app also enables paperless (cashless) transactions and passengers can make the payment through different digital modes such as R- R-Wallet, Paytm, UPI or through internet banking, etc., 3 per cent bonus will also be credited when the tickets are purchased through R-Wallet.