At last, Mumbaikars are making use of their cell phones to travel in local trains. There has been an increase of over 3.5 times in the number of commuters, who use the mobile ticketing system, as compared to last year. Between April to January 2019, 26,000 tickets, on an average, were sold through the UTS app as against a total of 7,000 in 2018-19. Data reveals that mobile ticketing — which started in December 2014 — began with a mere number of 87 tickets being sold per day until 2015. In the next financial year, the average sale rose to 575 tickets per day. This was the situation despite the extensive use of smartphones. In 2016-17, 1,700 tickets were sold on the mobile UTS app that has been devised by the Centre for Railway Information Systems. The app shows over 5 million downloads until now and allows booking of tickets for both suburban and long-distance trains. In 2017-18, the downloads and sale of tickets increased to an average of 7,100. "The demand remained consistently less in the initial years. We decided to take it to stations and then, started promoting the mobile ticketing system aggressively," said a senior Central Railway official. In 2018-19, the average sale stands at 26,000 plus. Sources said that this is between April to January. In the first fortnight of February, average sales have touched close to 46,000 tickets with regard to the suburban system. Sources said that the highest was seen on February 9 when 53,000 tickets were purchased using this mobile ticketing app. Currently, the maximum sale of tickets is witnessed by the manual counters at railway stations; they account for 60 per cent sales. This is followed by ATVMs which make up for 24 per cent of the sales. The railway officials claim that the sale through these red-silver coloured machines has remained consistent at 22-24 per cent. This is followed by jan sadharan ticket booking sevaks — the shops outside railway stations that have been allowed to sell suburban rail tickets at Rs 1 extra per ticket. Finally, mobile ticketing comes in, that constitutes 2 per cent of total sales. 2 per cent: Share of mobile ticketing as against total sales December 2014: Mobile ticketing was first launched 45,750: Average sale of tickets using mobile UTS app in Feb

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