New Delhi, Mar 15 (IANS): Indian Railways has extended computerisation of Parcel Management System (PMS) from 84 locations to 143 locations in phase-II and 523 locations in phase-III.

In a statement, the Ministry of Railways said that Railways' PMS has been undergoing total transformation and is geared to providing transportation for small consignments, over a vast network of stations.

"Small businesses and traders (especially in smaller cities and towns) have been using these services for transportation of their merchandises from bigger cities and production centres to the place of their business in a fast, reliable and cheap manner. Common man also uses these services for transportation of household goods, furniture, two-wheeler for which parcel services are the only convenient mode of transportation," the ministry said.

The ministry pointed that the charging of parcels is only done on the basis of weight and volume, and not on the basis of the type of commodity and the Provision of 120 days advance booking of parcel space has been enabled in PMS.

The ministry stated that barcoding on each consignment is done for tracking of parcel and status updation of packages through GPRS network via the transmission of data from handheld mobile devices through scanning of barcodes

"In order to undertake further modernization or revamp of PMS, as per the directions of Railway Board, QCI has been engaged to study the system and to suggest further improvements based on the customer feedback and the latest trends in this sector," the ministry said.