From Biometric Tickets To Linked PNRs Of Connecting Trains: 5 Ways Indian Railways Is Helping Passengers

A countless number of people choose to travel through railways almost every day. To avoid the rush and crowd in the trains, booking tickets is the only option, which however is not very easy, unfortunately. 

But not any more!

Indian Railways has made this difficult task a great deal simpler for us train passengers. Now, getting a confirmed train ticket is a lot easier. 

The national transporter has designed a few steps that passengers will need to take for a simpler train ticket booking and an easier overall train experience. 

What are the steps that the Indian Railways has put in place for customers? Find out right here!

Reservation Charts To Go Public

Taking a page out of the airlines, Indian Railways has decided to make the reservation charts to be public. This will help the passengers to choose their seats with proper knowledge of the seating arrangement. This will also increase the chance of securing a seat in the railways. 

The first chart is available online 4 hours before the train leaves, the second one is made available 30 minutes before the departure. The layout will be easily available and visible for everyone to see. 

Now, even the TTE will not be able to refuse any available seats on an ‘ad-hoc basis.’

Hand-held Terminals

The Indian Railways is going tech-savvy too with these Hand Held Terminals. These will be introduced in Rajdhani and Shatabdi Express. The HHT is GPS enabled and is a tablet-like device, which is given to the TTEs. They can use this to update real-time occupancy status in the trains. 

Biometric Linking for Unreserved Coaches

The biometric system will now help curb the unnecessary crowd and stampede that follows in the unreserved general coaches. Passengers will now have to buy tickets 

CNF Probability

As per a new initiative by IRCTC, passengers can now have an idea about the probability of the conformation of any wait-listed ticket.

In our experience, the probability highlighted by IRCTC matched 90% of the time. Using AI and historical data, this new feature helps the passenger to make an informed decision.

Linking of PNRs

In case the passenger has connecting trains, then now, they can link the PNRs of both the tickets, even if one has been issued via booking counter, and the other via online portal.

This linking of PNR helps in case one train missed due to late arrival of the other.