Indian Railways' freight business portal launched to provide one-stop solution to customers

Ease of doing business with Indian Railways gets a solid boost with the launch of Freight Business Development Portal.

File pic: Zee News

New Delhi: Union Minister for Railways Piyush Goyal on Tuesday (January 5) launched Indian Railways’ Freight Business Development Portal as the one-stop solution for all the needs of freight customers. The new portal will be a game-changer in ensuring ease of doing business with Railways as it aims to bring more transparency and professional support.

After launching the portal, Piyush Goyal said that it "will be game-changer in ensuring in ease of doing business with Railways. The portal will ensure that the best services are available to the clients."

Goyal further said, "Last 6 years have seen extraordinary development in all spheres of Railway operations under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Indian Railway is getting future-ready. The commitment of Railways to further improve the services is unflinching. The greatness of Railways would not just be in being better than someone else but being the BEST."

In a social media post, the ministry tweeted, "Hon'ble Minister Shri @PiyushGoyal inaugurates Indian Railways' Freight Business Development Portal. One stop cargo solution for seamless Goods transportation. Developed on "Customer First" principle. #RailFreightPortal"

Hon'ble Minister Shri @PiyushGoyal inaugurates Indian Railways' Freight Business Development Portal.

One stop cargo solution for seamless Goods transportation.
Developed on "Customer First" principle.#RailFreightPortal pic.twitter.com/0djEEsi8dq — Ministry of Railways (@RailMinIndia) January 5, 2021

The Minister for Railways said that Indian Railway is an invisible thread that connects the length and breadth of India, adding "During the lockdown, Railway showed its resolve in delivering the essential supplies to the nation in most challenging times and keep national supply chains running." 

Indian Railways is the backbone of the country's logistics sector. During 2020, when most of the activities were under lockdown, Indian Railways was providing relentless services in Freight transportation in the country. Indian Railways achieved the highest ever loading continuously in Sept, Oct, Nov, and Dec 2020.

Indian Railways has embraced a “Freight on Priority” policy by pushing for an aggressive customer-centric approach to expand the freight carried not only from the traditional segments but also by attracting new customers to its fold. 

The portal can be accessed by logging on to the Indian Railways website- https://indianrailways.gov.in/#  Or https://www.fois.indianrail.gov.in/RailSAHAY

The portal will ensure that all operations stay customer-centric, reduce the costs for logistics providers, provide an online tracking facility for suppliers, and also simplify the process of goods transportation.

It has been designed to replace physical processes with online ones to minimize the need for a human to human interaction. The Portal has been specially designed and developed keeping in mind the varied needs of all existing as well as new customers with a focus on ease of doing business, to bring more transparency and to provide professional support, according to the Ministry's statement. 

The Portal has been specially designed and developed keeping in mind the varied needs of all existing as well as new customers with a focus on ease of doing business, to bring more transparency, and to provide professional support. 

Key features of the Portal

1. New to Railways: This portal welcomes all the prospective customers of Indian Railways, introducing our freight business and listing various benefits, guiding them to search the most suitable terminal with detail of various terminal facilities and logistics services available, assisting them to choose the right wagon, presenting the expected charges and estimated time for their planned freight transportation. A new customer can register on this portal and place demand for wagons in the most convenient way.

2. Existing customers: Our prestigious freight customers are our most valuable assets, we’re committed to offer them the best-in-class services, the personalization and vital information that plays a key role in their business developments, sustenance, and expansions. 

The personalized dashboard of Freight Business Portal shall bring you the single view, which gives you access to your entire business with Indian Railways, your outstanding indents, on-run consignments, the status of various interactions, facility to apply for various services, and raising concerns. Live Track your on-run consignments through our GIS views, single-click applications for various services: discount schemes, diversion, rebooking, demurrage and wharfage waivers, stacking permissions, and many more. Get to know about rake allotments and pendency/maturity of indents at various freight terminals.

3. Commodity pages: The portal has commodity pages on major commodities transported by Railways: Coal, Minerals and Ores, Food Grain, Flour & Pulses, Cement & Clinker, Chemical Manure, Iron and Steel, Petroleum products, Container services, Automobile and more.

One can find the most suitable terminals suitable wagon, freight charges, expected transit time, and incentive schemes for  a selected commodity,  that handle your commodity near you, in your district or state. Introducing you with different types of wagons that carry your commodity and their loading preferences, presenting a variety of incentive schemes to facilitate your logistics requirements and flexibility of two-point loadings/unloadings.

4. Tools and services: Your business is of utmost importance for us, we value your time and are committed to offering you the frequently accessed tools and services to provide direct access to vital information.

Get access to various tools and services for planning your optimum freight transportation with Indian Railways. Our rate slabs for various commodity movements, wagon catalogue, terminal selector, smart calculator and track & trace. Information on various important services like timetabled movements, mini rake services and approved two-point rake combinations are just a click away now.

5. Logistics partners: Indian Railways invites and welcomes partnerships in Indian Railways freight operations across the country. You may join our network through investments in Private Sidings, Private Freight Terminals, or Railways Owned Goods Sheds to make railways, a part of your supply chain.  Investments in rolling stock could fetch you numerous benefits like assured availability and incentives in freight charges. We invite aggregators, truckers, warehouse owners, and labour providers to offer their services for our 9000+ freight customers at 4000+ freight terminals.

6. Professional support: Indian Railways is always committed to providing professional support to our valued customers.  The customers can contact Indian Railway officials on phone or in writing. The customers can send their suggestions, query, or complaint to Indian Railways through the contact us option. For every request received in writing, a unique request ID is sent to the customer to track the status of the request.  Indian Railways will be happy to serve the queries of the customers.

It is important to note that Freight figures continue to maintain the high momentum in terms of earnings and loading in the month of December 2020 for Indian Railways. On mission mode, Indian Railways' Freight loading for the month of December 2020 crossed last year’s loading and earnings for the same period.