Mumbai: Machines for swiping debit cards have still not arrived at toll plazas at five entry points in the city, making Tuesday the fourth day in a row when commuters travelling to work and back could not carry out cashless transactions.
Apparently, toll plazas were to receive the machines on December 2. However, the bulk order has made it difficult for machines to be made available within such a short time frame. The five entry points at Thane, Mulund, Airoli and Vashi have been seeing serpentine queues ever since toll plaza developers were allowed to resume toll collection. Sources revealed that though commuters have been carrying exact change for the past few days, failure to deliver the machines has created further chaos accompanied by losses.
A source said, “When we were told to stop collecting toll for a few days after the demonetisation move, we also ordered machines as we knew that people would not tender exact change. However, since we have placed a bulk order, delivery is delayed.”
Even Bandra-Worli Sea Link (BWSL) did not get the machines on Tuesday due to which, coupons and gift cards had to be used to tackle the paucity of cash. Spokesperson of MEP Infrastructure Developers Ltd said, “We are to get swipe card machines at BWSL in a few hours and we have not been able to get these machines at the five entry points as well but they will arrive at the earliest.”
Dr Vidya Pathare (45) who uses the Vashi toll plaza, recalled her nightmare of a commute. “I basically have no leave and for the past four days, I have had to use the toll plaza. Saturday was the worst and people were really upset waiting in long queues however today, I saw many people tender exact change of Rs 35 to avoid delay which is why I moved up the queue to the toll window in 20 minutes,” she said.
