Hyderabad Airport: India’s leading airport operator GMR has launched a fully contactless car parking facility at Hyderabad International Airport on Friday.
“Hyderabad International Airport now offers India’s first and only fully contact-less airport car parking experience for passengers and visitors, GMR said.
The company said in the age of COVID-19 pandemic, going Contact-less is the new mantra.
The infrastructure major said it has scaled up its NETC (National Electronic Toll Collection) FASTag Car Parking in collaboration with NPCI (National Payments Corporation of India) integrating 10 NETC FASTag Issuer banks and will go live with other issuer banks in the next few weeks.
In order to mitigate the risk of spread of Covid-19 virus among the air travellers, the company has earlier started a completely contactless boarding experience for passenger at the Hyderabad airport.
“Now passengers and visitors can avail a fully contactless car parking experience thanks to the collaboration with NPCI and NETC, which has now made our car parking fully compatible with any NETC FASTag Issuing Banks in India,” said Pradeep Panicker, CEO, GHIAL.
He said the company first tested this facility with the tags issued by the ICICI Bank and now it is opening up to all other issuers.
READ: Night warfare: Indian Army to procure thermal imaging device for grenade launchers
“Now customers holding any bank NETC FASTag could zip through the airport car parking with zero-contact transactions having full control over their safe travels,” Panicker said in a statement sent to Defence Star.
While, the traditional mode of transaction with digital payment over-the-counter option will also be available, the contactless car parking systems will be available for more safety and any visitor can avail the NETC FASTag option at the airport car parking.
READ: Indian Army’s Signal Corps seeks mobile communication system for high Himalayas
“In the COVID prevalent situation of current times, this will offer safety in making digital payments as well,” said Praveena Rai, Chief Operating Officer of NPCI.
“This is a primary focus for us,” she said.
The NETC FASTag solution is based on a simple-to-use, reloadable electronic RFID tag which enables automatic deduction of applicable parking charges, while one drives through the car Park without stopping for any cash transaction.
This system was introduced at Hyderabad International Airport for ease of payments and reduces queuing at the entry and exit of the parking lot.
READ: Tata Power SED to modernise India’s military airfields in a $160 million contract
How does Hyderabad Airport’s contactless car parking system work?
This automated system entails a customer buying the NETC FASTag, which is linked to a prepaid account. The tag employs Radio-frequency Identification (RFID) technology and needs to be affixed on the vehicle’s windscreen after the tag account is active.
READ: India will spend $5.2 billion on combat jets, cruise missiles to face an aggressive China
The RFID Tag is mapped with NPCI by the issuer bank(s). The subscriber of this system can use the parking without any manual intervention, such as waiting for a parking receipt at the entry or making cash/credit card payment at the exit.
There is no additional cost to customers with respect to the parking fee. One has to just purchase a one-time tag which does away with the wait time at entry and exit.
READ: GMR Group wins contract for development, operation of new airport in Andhra Pradesh
Dedicated NETC FASTag lanes are in place at entry, when a user arrives through this lane, the strategically placed RFID reader will capture the tag with the timestamp and store the details in the local data base.
While exiting, the same will be reconciled and the chargeable parking fee is automatically deducted allowing the passengers to virtually zip through the parking lot in no time.
The user will receive SMS on the deducted amount following the completion of transaction.
GMR said this initiative is in line with the Govt. of India’s mission to have ‘One Nation One Tag – NETC FASTag scheme.
READ: Dassault Reliance Aerospace resumes operations at Nagpur plant
READ: COVID-19: Indian Army Headquarters to work with bare minimum staff
Defence Star, (www.defencestar.in) India’s leading defence news portal, is also available on Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and YouTube.