Commuters booking a pre-paid taxi outside Dum Dum airport will no longer be told “only cash”.
They will now be able to use cards or a unified payment interface (UPI).
In the last two years, only cash was accepted to book a pre-paid taxi causing inconvenience to a large number of flyers who either did not have adequate cash on them or found it difficult to withdraw cash from the closest ATM, which is located at around a distance of 500 metres.
Three point-of-sale (POS) machines have been installed in three out of five pre-paid booking counters from Saturday, an official of the taxi union in charge of maintaining the taxi booths said.
Two more machines are likely to be set up by the end of the coming week, he added.
Officers of Bidhannagar police said on average, 35,000 to 38,000 commuters book pre-paid taxis from outside the airport every month.
Cards and online payments were accepted at only one counter earlier but even that stopped in the wake of the pandemic-induced lockdown.
“The POS machine that was installed in one of the counters had become non-functional when there was a complete lockdown in the country and there were many restrictions on flying. However, as things started to normalise only-cash mode was started for prepaid booking,” said an officer of Bidhannagar city police.
The only-cash mode caused inconvenience among many, including those flying from other countries, to arrange cash in order to book a taxi. It also resulted in long queues outside the counter, delaying the booking process, the officer added.
The online or card mode of payment was resumed from Saturday.
“It is a relief that I could book a taxi using my card. While booking a pre-paid taxi, the fare is fixed. I prefer that. The last time I flew to Calcutta six months ago, from Bangalore, I had to book an app cab as I did not have cash on me and it cost me more than usual because of a surge,” said Roshni Mukherjee, a resident of Garfa.