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The inception of e-ticketing has
taken the country by storm. Within four months of introducing
the Indian railway e-ticket, more than half the number of
passengers who used Internet chose to book their tickets online
through e-ticketing. All you need is a printer to take a print-
out of the ticket. With the necessary identification, you can
set out on your journey with that slip of paper. Two or even
three copies can be taken.
In case you misplace your ticket you will always have another
copy. Incase you do not have printer, you can always get it
printed at any cyber café. The comparative ease of access to
tickets, minimal service charge and increased accessibility to
computers and printers seem to be the main reasons for
e-ticketing to be on the rise. |
The first thing that you have to do to avail of india railways
e-ticketing facility is to register at irctc.co.in. For
registration, you have to equip yourself with a User name and
Password of your choice. In all future logins for booking
tickets or otherwise, the same user name and password has to be
used. Now you will be able to login into the site. On the left
hand side there is a feature “plan my travel and book my
ticket”. Insert the codes for the source city and the
destination city.
Choose the date of travel, choose the class of travel, and
choose whether you want I-ticket, Tatkal or e-ticket. Click on
“go” and you will have in front of you all the available trains.
Check the availability status on the train of your choice and if
berths are available, then click on “book ticket”. A new page
appears asking for details like train name, name of passenger,
type of berth, etc. Once this is done, say, “make payment”.
A drop down box will give you various means to pay for the
ticket. Choose one by clicking on it.
While making payment ensure that the security lock is there at
the bottom of the screen, it ensures the security of your
transaction. Once the transaction is completed, a message will
appear. Your ticket is ready to be printed.
Remember you can book an e-ticket only if your ticket is
confirmed or RAC. After a successful transaction a confirmation
message and a e-mail from irctc will be sent to your mail box.
If the ticket information page is not visible, go to “booked
tickets “ and check whether your latest transaction figures in
the list. If it is not present, then it means that the ticket
has not been booked. The amount that you paid to IRCTC will be
credited to your account without any charges.
In case you want to cancel the ticket, it can be done only
through the Internet and that too before the chart is prepared.
You cannot cancel an e-ticket at the railway counter. To cancel
a ticket, log in to the irctc site, go to booked tickets, select
the ticket to be cancelled, select the passengers to be
cancelled and complete the transaction.
If however, the main identity holder wants to cancel his\her
ticket, then all passengers in the ticket will be automatically
cancelled. Usually a confirmation of the cancellation is sent
online and the amount is credited to the respective bank
account. If the cancellation is a partial one, take care to see
that the modified ticket is printed separately.
With the booking hours extended from 4.00 a.m. to 11.30 p.m. on
weekdays and 4.00 a.m. to 8 p.m on Sundays, e-ticketing is only
going to see an upward curve.
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