Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) has tied up with Paytm, payment and e-commerce website, to offer an additional payment gateway for food ordered through its e-catering facility.
“We have roped in leading payment and e-commerce player Paytm for providing maximum options to passengers for making online payments. Efforts are underway to bring in some more reputed caterers in our e-catering portfolio,” said IRCTC chairman and MD A K Manocha in a statement.
Passengers will have an array of choices for making payments for e-catering like prepaid (online payment) or cash on delivery (CoD) as per their convenience.
Earlier this month, Gurgaon-based MobiKwik also announced that Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) has chosen its wallet as the first payment option on the latter’s Connect Android App.
The integration, live on the Android app, enables instant one-tap payments for ticket bookings, the company said. MobiKwik also plans to extend this to IRCTC’s other digital platforms.
Read: IRCTC’s modernisation makeover continues with MobiKwik tie-up
On an average, IRCTC clocks 5.5 to six lakh e-catering bookings daily. The e-catering service was started as a pilot in June with 28 non-pantry car trains. Under the new system passengers can preorder their meal on an app or website, by phone or SMS, and then pay online or on delivery at a station of their choice.
The station-based e-catering has now been made available in 45 major stations, including Mumbai Central, Pune, Howrah, Sealdah, Guwahati, New Jalpaiguri, Patna, Bhubaneshwar, Visakhapatnam, Mugalsarai, Kanpur Central, Lucknow, Varanasi, Jaipur, Bilaspur, Kharagpur, Allahabad, Gorakhpur, Amritsar and Chandigarh.
IRCTC crossed online sales worth nearly USD3 billion (Rs.20,620 crore) in fiscal 2014-15, and has been aggressively pushing towards modernisation of its ticketing and consumer services platforms in recent months. Last month, it tied up with online delivery firm Foodpanda, enabling consumers to order from a variety of cuisine options. The collaboration, to be launched at New Delhi railway station this month, will provide customers with the choice to order meals at least two hours before the travel.
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