BHUBANESWAR SMART CITY FLOATS TENDER FOR COMMON PAYMENT CARD SYSTEM
The Bhubaneswar Smart City Limited (BSCL) on Tuesday floated tender for implementation of Common Payment Card System (CPCS), which will enable citizens with payment options for services offered by multiple agencies – Public Health Engineering Organsation (PHEO), Central Electricity Supply Utility (CESU) and parking charges besides public transport. The proposed CPCS can be used to travel by the city-based transport system, pay bills to the Bhubaneswar Municipal Corporation (BMC), purchase goods from retail stores, pay for movie tickets, dine and shop within the City. The last date for submission of bid is March 21. The project will be completed within six months from the commencement of work, said sources.
With about 2.5 lakh households, Bhubaneswar is expected to witness around 30 million payment transactions for municipal services every year by 2018. General manager (Operations) BSCL, Binay Dash said with the CPCS in place, emphasis will be laid on cash-less and digital transactions. “The design will be cost-effective, sustainable and technology-based solution, accessible to citizens across varied economic segments,” he said. BSCL will implement an inter-operable payment ecosystem through cards and mobile phones. The concessionaire will have to manage supply of smart cards, issuance and personalisation infrastructure for distribution of smart card in coordination with utility companies like Bhubaneswar Puri Transport Services Limited (BPTSL), CESU and PHEO and retail units, Dash added.
The private partner (bank or financial institution) will also work on creation of infrastructure which involves integration of the smart cards with access terminals including seamless adoption of card on retail payment gateways – Europay, MasterCard, Visa and Rupay enabled terminals – at specific locations. The work will be carried out in public-private partnership mode where the concessionaire will be entrusted with establishing a smart card host management system and operating a central clearance house. It will also design, market and deploy customized citizen loyalty programmes, with an objective to maximise the penetration and use of the Common Payment card. Earlier, on December 16, the BSCL had organised a pre-tender workshop on developing a CPCS in which 17 banking organisations, including six public sector banks and three mobile banking organisations had participated.
