eGovWatch: Railways launches passenger complaint portal, Mobile Phone App

After three days of the budget, Railways on Monday launched a mobile phone App and also an online portal with a view to providing customers with “an effective forum to lodge complaints”.

Railway minister Suresh Prabhu said that people can also use these forums to send suggestions for  improving railway services and if found suitable the valuable suggestions on the newly-launched portal will be incorporated.

“There should not be any complaints ideally, but if about 3 crore passengers will travel in more than 10,000 trains daily, some complaints might come up,” Prabhu said.

“So, there should be an effective forum to lodge complaints,” Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu said after launching the portal and the App.

Passengers can lodge their complaints and suggestions on the webpage www.indianrailways.gov.in. One can also download the mobile App from the URL www.coms.indianrailways.gov.in. for registering complaints and sending suggestions.

Passengers can also SMS their complaints to the number: 9717630982. The launch of complaint management was part of the Rail Budget proposals.

The complaint will be auto assigned to the railway official concerned for redressal. The complainant will  receive a message on his mobile phone and via email about the action taken on the matter.

As to a time-frame for the redressal of complaints, the Railway Minister said, “We will finalise the time-frame after a few days of stabilisation of the system.”

Railways will advertise the portal and the App on social networking sites and other platforms to popularise it.

The Customer Complaint Portal will later also be available in Hindi and other regional languages.

Prabhu said that besides registering complaints, a system has also been devised to track the status of the complaints.

After registering a complaint, the complainant will be given a unique ID number which can be used for  tracking the progress of the complaint.

“One can also send images like dirty linen or whatever one wants to complain about through the system,” he said.