IRCTC To Offer New ATMs and to Work For Destination Weddings
IRCTC is aiming to expand upon its non-fare sources of income. This comes as only about 5 percent of all the income that IRCTC gets come from non-fare sources. Two rather interesting developments have come about as a means of expanding upon this revenue. This comes amid meetings with heads of all of the Railway Zones in India. The meetings were designed to try and find ways to expand the non-fare revenues of the rail system to about Rs. 2,000 crore in a year.
These two developments are paired with many other opportunities for the rail system to get more revenue. These include developments relating to weddings and ATMs being added in many spaces.
Wedding Support
One of the more interesting solutions to come about entails offering rail platforms as wedding sites. Some rail platforms run by Indian Railways will be converted to where weddings can be held on these spots.
This is to be designed as a means of promoting destination weddings. This especially comes as these will be rather unique places for weddings to be held in.
The Surat Platform #4 will be the first of these platforms to be converted for wedding use. This will include some extended open spaces that may be used for weddings among other large events.
ATMs Will Be Added
ATMs will also be added onto many of the stations around the country. About 2,000 ATMs will be installed around these stations. Bank officials have been sharing information on these stations and how they will be used.
All contracts for handling ATMs will be used for a ten-year period. An online auction will help with reviewing who will get these ATMs out.
Additional branding services will be available to those who get their ATMs out. This is to make it easier for banks to benefit from having their ATMs available as they can market their works to more stations.
These ATMs will help people with using many financial functions as needed. These will especially be popular among those looking to take care of cashless transactions if needed. This will come as more ATMs will have upgraded support for different cashless functions in the future.
What Else Is Being Offered?
While the addition of ATMs and wedding venue support will be points to look forward to, other options for getting added funds are being explored just as well. These include options such as the following:
- On-demand entertainment services will be added onto trains in the future. These are designed to provide people with videos and music in many forms. This will provide the rail system with funds from different entertainment groups that pay to have their programs online.
- Branded trains will also be considered. This works in that a vinyl covering will be applied onto the outside of a train. This will result in a train being fully covered with a particular design in mind. This can help with advertising many concepts.
- Electronic billboards are being added in many terminals. These include some that can change their messages on occasion, thus allowing for more companies to buy up spaces on those boards at a given time.
- Advertisements on the inside parts of coaches are also being added. These include vinyl wrappings that can cover the entire inside part of a cabin to create a larger branding space where a message will become much more visible.
Details on who would take advantage of these opportunities or how often they will be utilized will be revealed later on. These are expected to help the rail system with getting more money for all sorts of uses.
Monetization Will Still Occur
These new plans will continue to work alongside the monetization of passenger data that IRCTC has been using. The nearly 100 terabytes of data on passengers have been shared as a means of helping advertisers and other groups relating to the rail system with targeting those passengers. The information does not identify any extremely specific type of person but it does list information on how people use the rail system around India and what types of trends might come about.
A Need To Get Money
Indian Railways is hoping to use these solutions to help raise funds. The organization has been losing about Rs. 33,000 crore per year. This comes as about Rs. 77,000 crore is spent each year on operations. Meanwhile, about Rs. 44,000 crore comes into the organization through passenger fares. By expanding upon the non-fare revenues in the organization, Indian Railways is hoping to keep from losing far too much money.
Details on added ways for the Indian Railways organization to get money will be revealed in the future although it is unclear as to what might be used in the future.
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