TSRTC to go cashless

​Hyderabad: The Telangana State Road Transport Corporation would go 100 per cent cashless by the end of this financial year with the proposed introduction of swipe machines replacing the present ticket issuing machines (TIMs).

Transport Minister P Mahender Reddy told the media on Monday that so far 90 per cent of transactions are made in cash and only 10 per cent were being made through digital mode.

Following the demonetisation and the decision of the state government to encourage cashless transactions, the TSRTC has decided to speed up the process.

To begin with, the minister said, online transactions would be encouraged in long-distance buses and later on in the rural areas.

A special awareness drive would be taken up shortly to encourage the payment through debit and credit cards, he said.

RTC MD G V Ramana Rao said the corporation was even trying to see if it was possible to have one single swiping machine which can also issue tickets.

He said the corporation was planning to introduce swiping machines at major bus stations in the state and at the city bus pass counters.

Ramana Rao said that they have entered into an agreement with the SBH for the swiping machines. Initially, the swiping machines would be used for current reservation bookings at bus stations. The corporation would also come up with e-wallet for online transactions, he added.

According to the minister, the RTA had switched over to online payments even before the demonetisation was announced.

Cash transactions were taking place only in certain services like special number reservation and collection of taxes for contract carriage buses.

Henceforth, payments for these services can be made through demand draft. Efforts were on to introduce cashless transactions for these services.

As far as payments at checkpost were concerned, swiping machines were being used he said.