Digital tracks: ticketing system for Lower Silesian Railways

Lower Silesian Railways is a regional rail carrier that provides transportation services for residents of the Lower Silesian province and visitors to the Lower Silesia region. The first train of the Lower Silesian Railways hit the road in 2009, and since then the company has focused on providing passenger services, connecting cities and towns in the region. The Lower Silesian Railway offers modern rolling stock, providing comfortable travel for passengers. The carrier also focuses on innovation, investing in IT infrastructure and introducing modern ticketing systems, improving customer service and adapting to modern travelers' expectations.

The company is also increasing its share of the passenger transport market and currently serves more than five percent of the market.

Challenges - baseline

Annually, more than 19 million people travel on the trains of the Lower Silesian Railway, and this number has been growing steadily since the company was established. The carrier provides travelers with several channels to purchase train tickets, including: stationary ticket offices, ticket vending machines, a dedicated website and a mobile application. In addition, travelers have the option of purchasing a ticket on board the train, directly from the conductor's team. The ticketing system used by train managers and conductors was based on mobile terminals with embedded software, running on a Windows platform. Such a solution allowed only the basic function of ticket sales, with limited ticket inspection options. Conductors needed different code readers, making it take more time to serve passengers. The managers of the Lower Silesian Railway decided to modernize the functioning IT system and purchase new equipment to raise customer service standards and improve the work of conductor teams.

Course of implementation

The employees of the Lower Silesian Railway developed requirements for the functionality of the central ticketing IT system, taking into account both the handling of different types of tickets, the presentation of the offer, the flexibility to adapt to the changing needs of travelers, and the effective management of data and transaction information. For the implementation of this project, the carrier was looking for an IT company that specializes in preparing complex systems for passenger service. After a careful analysis of competitive offers, the regional carrier decided to cooperate with Axians (formerly S&T) - one of the largest integrators operating on the Polish market. The Axians team was responsible for the strategic and operational management of the project, as well as for supporting work related to the integration of the solution with other elements of the Lower Silesian Railway's IT ecosystem. The integrator was also responsible for ensuring the highest security standards and selecting appropriate technology.

The main subcontractor for the project was Antumo, a company specializing in projects in the area of regional transportation.

Additionally, Antumo specializes in comprehensive support of devices using Auto ID technology, with particular emphasis on, mobile terminals and wireless printers. The engineering work carried out by Axians was to ensure that the new system would integrate effectively with the regional carrier's existing technology infrastructure. The IT solution was to be complemented by a mobile device management (MDM, for mobile device management) system.

According to the provisions of the contract with Axians, the IT system and hardware were to be delivered within six months of its signing, thus ensuring that the regional carrier had quick and timely access to modern solutions.

First implementation of the OSDM standard in Poland.

Building a comprehensive solution

Project implementation began with a needs analysis, which included defining project goals, assessing resources and reviewing existing infrastructure. The work schedule and scope of the various stages were also developed at this stage. As a first step, Antumo engineers developed the functionalities of the complex software, which consists of several modules: a passenger service system, a fare system and a 2D code center system.

According to the contractual provisions, the passenger service system allows the sale of fare tickets, control of own tickets and those issued by other carriers and organizers (including on contactless cards), control of entitlements to statutory discounts (validation by reading the code on the card). In addition, the sales application has an option for issuing passenger credentials and summonses in situations where a passenger does not have a valid ticket. It also provides access to current train schedules and generates service reports. In the first year of cooperation, the application was installed on 250 conductor terminals supplied by Axians. The servicing of the devices is provided by Antumo. The system has also been adapted to the stationary sales model at Lower Silesian Railways' partner points under the KD Partner program. The system has been integrated with fiscal cash registers and printers, and the sale itself is carried out using mobile terminals.

The second of the developed systems - a 2D code center - has the function of generating codes on tickets issued in the sales application, as well as providing operators of online ticket sales and other carriers with the data necessary for proper placement of codes on tickets.

- This solution has enabled us to integrate our sales system with external sales platforms, e.g. KOLEO, SkyCash, BILKOM, as well as passenger service systems of other carriers with which we have agreements on mutual ticketing, including foreign railroad companies. Tickets generated by our sales system comply with the requirements of the International Union of Railways (UIC), which guarantees that they are accepted by carriers such as Deutsche Bahn and České Dráhy, which are members of the organization. As a result, we can provide cross-border services, and our passengers can travel seamlessly using foreign partners - emphasizes Bartosz Jungiewicz, commercial director of Lower Silesian Railways.

Another part of the software provided by Axians and written by Antumo is the fare-editing system, which makes it possible to enter into the sales application the fare offers that Lower Silesian Railways sells. These include single tickets, weekly tickets, monthly tickets, tickets for transporting bicycles, luggage and animals, relational tickets, non-relational (network) tickets, and dedicated offers, such as weekend tickets. An important element of the portfolio of offers of the Lower Silesian Railways are border tickets to the Czech Republic and Germany, the sale of which is also carried out using the supplied software. The project was complemented by the implementation of Antumo MDM, a system for managing mobile devices.

Digital travel

In the first stage of the cooperation, conductor teams were equipped with 250 mobile kits, consisting of a Bluebird-branded mobile terminal and a wireless Bixolon printer, meaning that each conductor serving travelers was provided with their own devices.

An innovative solution in the Polish rail market was Antumo's extension of the data included in the ticket inspection report to include the location of each ticket inspection using the mobile terminal's GPS. The inspection location data significantly enriched the business analytics capabilities and allows to better tailor the offer to the needs of travelers.

- In agglomeration traffic, there is a very high turnover of passengers boarding and alighting at individual stations. This means that checking each traveler's ticket is very time-consuming for the train manager. Equipping conductor teams with state-of-the-art terminals has significantly reduced the time needed to handle ticket sales and checks, as employees use a 2d code scanner, which works much faster, Bartosz Jungiewicz points out.

Initially, the mobile terminals were used by conductor teams only for ticket sales and control, but over time they have found another use and currently employees use them as a tablet and cell phone.

- The designed and delivered solutions meet our expectations, so we are developing the cooperation by supplementing the IT infrastructure with further functionalities," concludes Bartosz Jungiewicz.

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Step-by-step design:

• pre-implementation analysis
• development of software
• delivery of mobile terminals with software installed
• configuration of hardware
• training of employees
• launching the software

Applied solutions

• mobile cash register sets
• passenger service system
• fare system
• 2D code center system
• mobile device management system

Antumo MDM

• remote management of a fleet of mobile devices
• remote ability to manage applications on devices
• device location visibility

Benefits of implementation

• scalable IT structure: ability to install systems on additional hardware sets
• multichannel sales: integration with external sales platforms
• quality of service: streamlining the ticket inspection and sales process
• expansion of the company's IT ecosystem: sharing data for business analytics
• multifunctionality of purchased equipment: terminals are used as a mobile passenger service point, tablet and mobile phone
• flexibility of the system: adaptation of the API to standards