The Hindu Business Line : PCO booths get smarter with new do-all device

New Delhi May 18 The traditional public call office booths are all set to go through a dramatic change. Soon, you will be able to pay your utility bills, check your bank balance, buy movie tickets, transfer money, buy railway or airline tickets, recharge your pre-paid card phones, send SMS and make a telephone call all through a single device.

Tata Teleservices is launching a new telecom device branded `Parsec' that will allow consumers to do all this from a single point.

The company is tying up with mobile electronic top up service providers, banks, airlines ticketing service providers and the IRCTC to roll out more than 1.5 lakh such devices across the country in kirana stores and large retail chains on the PCO booth model.

Better share

Speaking to Business Line Mr Vikas Shah, Head-Access Business Unit, Tata Teleservices, said, "We plan to introduce this device by next quarter. We have outsourced the manufacturing of Parsec to a firm in Malaysia." Mr Shah added that retailers would be able to set up the device by paying an upfront charge of Rs 7,000-9,000.

The move is aimed at increasing Tata Teleservices' market share in the growing PCO segment. According to one industry estimate, about 71 per cent Indians at the `bottom of the pyramid' go to public booths to make a call as against 35 per cent in Pakistan, 30 per cent in Sri Lanka, 8 per cent in the Philippines and 7 per cent in Thailand.

While the retailer providing the service will get additional revenue streams in the form of commission from sale of tickets and services, Tata Teleservices will make money from providing the telecom infrastructure for carrying out the transaction by connecting the device to banks. Tata Teleservices has tied up with ICICI Bank to process the transactions and has also got a certification from the Mastercard-Visa consortium.

It alos offers banks an alternative to setting up its own point of sale terminals for swiping the credit cards. "The business model for putting up POS terminals at retail outlets saddles the bank with a large base of `non performing assets' in all those outlets, where the volume of transactions is not enough to recover the cost of the equipment. "We will deploy Parsec terminals at our own cost and charge rentals from banks for each Parsec activated with POS functionality. This model reduces the threshold volume of transactions that the bank deems necessary for activation of POS functionality at the outlet," said Mr Shah.

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