New Delhi:
Railway passengers will have to shell out more for travelling by Rajdhani, Shatabdi and Duronto trains from September 9.Â
The pricing mechanism is coupled with operational issues which could be discomforting to the passengers. Since booking can only be done four months in advance, one will have to book tickets early to get them at the normal fare.
Labelled as "Surge Pricing", the phenomenon is nothing but passing on the incremental effects of ticketing to the ultimate consumers, the railway passengers.
The 'Surge Pricing' fare mechanism has received flak by the passengers who would face the brunt of the cleverly packaged incremental ticketing.Â
In recent times, the surge pricing financial gimmick introduced by radio taxi provider like Ola and Uber was struck down by the the Delhi High Court.Â
The pricing mechanism is coupled with operational issues which could be discomforting to the passengers. Since booking can only be done four months in advance, one will have to book tickets early to get them at the normal fare.Â
Once the price reaches 50 per cent more,the passenger has no option but to wait for the Tatkal ticket which is available only a day or two before the journey. Effectively, the final ticket would cost much more than the base price with no certainty of a berth.Â
This could also force a large chunk of the elite passenger club to switch to air travel. But the lower paying passenger segment shall have their travel modes hanging in this air.
With its latest policies of increasing rail fares, the Indian railways is on clear cut mission of increasing its revenue streams exponentially. This ambitious move at the cost of passing the buck to the stakeholders without any improvisation to their services could have deeper ramifications.
Rail ticket surge pricing: Are you ready to pay more if Indian Railways provides better facilities?
— News Nation (@NewsNationTV) September 9, 2016
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Are you still confused how this system works? Let's have a look at the points below to understand it-
# 10 per cent of the seats will be sold in the normal fare in the beginning.
# It will go on increasing by 10 per cent with every 10 per cent of berths.
# The tickets will be sold with a ceiling of 50 per cent.
# The flexi fare system will be introduced in Second AC, Third AC, Chair Car in Rajdhani, Shatabdi and Duranto trains besides Sleeper class in Duronto trains.Â
# First Ac and Executive Class have been kept out of the new system of the already prevailing high tariffs.
# The base fare for the three premium trains will be on flexi fare system.
# There are total 42 Rajdhani trains, 46 Shatabdi and 54 Duronto trains and railways expect to garner about Rs 500 crore from the new fare structure in these trains.
# The passenger revenue target for the current fiscal is Rs 51,000 crore as against Rs 45,000 crore in the last fiscal, an increase of Rs 6,000 cr for 2016-17.
# The Railway Ministry will review the experimental flexi fare system, which is dynamic in nature in these trains, after three or four months.
# The flexi fare system will act as a measure against touts.
# For Second AC and Chair Car, the maximum hike will be 50 per cent.
# For Third AC, it will be 40 per cent.
# According to railway oficials, the hike is about one and a half times more in the flexi system.
# Reservation charges, superfast charge, catering charges, service tax shall remain unchanged.
Let's understand the surge pricing with this example:
# The New Delhi-Mumbai Third AC fare in Mumbai Rajdhani is Rs 1,628 as base fare.
# The fare will be Rs 1,791 with 10 pere cent increase.
# It will go upto Rs 2,279 with maximum 50 per cent increase.
# So, the base fare for a third AC ticket in Delhi-Mumbai Rajdhani is is Rs 1,628, and it will go up to Rs. 2,279 maximum.  Â
Important to know:
# The revised fares will not apply to tickets already issued for journeys to commence on or after September 9, 2016.Â
# In case of tickets already issued at the pre-revised rates, the difference of the fare will not be collected from passengers.
