IRCTC’s New Website Is Live: 5 Exciting Updates Every Rail Passenger Should Be Aware Of!
The website will use Indian Rail’s last 13 years of passenger data and use a predictive model to inform the passengers whether their tickets would be confirmed or not.
Indian Railways has launched a new, enhanced version of their IRCTC website, which promises more punch, more features and a user-friendly browsing experience.
The new website was made live at midnight and can be accessed right here.
Here are 5 exciting updates, which every rail passenger should be aware of:
Contents
1. Predictions On Waitlisted Tickets
The website will use Indian Rail’s last 13 years of passenger data and use a predictive model to inform the passengers whether their tickets would be confirmed or not.
As per railway officials, this would be a “robust, workable model”.
A senior Railways official said,
“According to the new feature of wait-list prediction, one can predict the chances of a wait-listed or an RAC ticket getting confirmed on the basis of booking trends. We will mine our own data of passenger operations and booking patterns for the first time,”
This idea for predictions came from Railways Minister Piyush Goyal.
2. Change Boarding Stations Online
The new website of IRCTC will allow passengers to change their boarding points.
This can be done till 24 hours of the train’s departure, and once done, it cannot be redone. All previous rights to board the train from the original station would be lost. Online tickets with VIKALP option and i-Tickets are not eligible for this new change.
In order to change the boarding point, the passenger will have to visit the Booked Tickets history.
3. Easy Access
The new website doesn’t need a login to enquire and search for trains. The older website allowed only registered and logged-in users to use the functionality.
4. Personalized Profiles
Now, passengers can create separate cards as per the profiles, and use them while booking tickets. These profiles or cards will have all the passenger details pre-filled and can be extremely useful for tatkal tickets when the time is of the essence.
5. Synchronized Data
Greater synchronization between IRCTC website and their mobile app has been made. For instance, now the mobile app will feature ladies quota and premium tatkal options while booking tickets. Data of booked tickets and cancelled tickets would be now synchronized between these two platforms.
Besides these changes in the website, IRCTC has also allowed changing names on online tickets, which was not allowed previously.
However, for this, the passenger will have to visit the nearest railway station counter and show ID proof to make the changes.
This name change can be only made with family members, that is father, mother, brother, sister, son, daughter, husband and wife, and must be requested 24 hours prior to the train departure.
Last but least no option to update name in the profile section of the account holder to link Aadhaar number :p …… This is the biggest feature they must concentrate.