{"id":6232,"date":"2016-06-22T00:59:22","date_gmt":"2016-06-21T19:29:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/?p=6232"},"modified":"2026-07-17T22:05:07","modified_gmt":"2026-07-17T16:35:07","slug":"why-the-indian-railways-uts-app-is-pure-evil","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/13.207.105.184\/?p=6232","title":{"rendered":"Off the Rails: Why the Indian Railways\u2019 UTS App is Pure Evil"},"content":{"rendered":"\nJ<\/span>ust like there are some people who want to watch the whole world burn, there are apps that seem to exist for the sole purpose of getting users to pull their hair out. And given my sparse pate, you can probably guess that I\u2019m a victim of one such application \u2014 the Indian Railways\u2019 UTS app.\n\nFor those fortunate enough to never have needed it, UTS is the Indian Railways\u2019 app to book tickets for suburban railway travel. My first experience using it came when I needed to travel on a Mumbai local<\/a>, and since then, I\u2019ve been convinced that the app\u2019s developers were keen on ensuring that the ticketing experience matched the hellish nature of the journey.\n\nWhile I acknowledge that there are other bad apps<\/a> out there, many are so because they were built on a budget and\/or didn\u2019t have access to good developers. That\u2019s not the case here. When you first download the app, you will notice that there are a few truly ingenious features (and I use that term loosely) that must have taken some skill to deploy. The only problem is that this skill has been used to aid frustration rather than convenience.\n\nThe most common example of this is the \u201cradius of booking\u201d, which means you need to be within a very precise distance from a train station<\/a> to be able to book tickets \u2014 not too far, not too close.\n\n

While most apps try their best to separate you from your money, UTS is refreshingly anti-capitalistic.<\/p><\/blockquote> \n\nI don\u2019t understand the outer limit of this \u2014 so if someone\u2019s sitting in Dadar wanting to book a train originating in Andheri<\/a>, 20 km away, they can\u2019t? The inner limit, I understand \u2014 to avoid ticketless travel and booking on seeing the TC. But this is such a limited scenario (given how far and few checkings are) that it basically just seems like a cruel way to inconvenience the majority.\n\n

\"uts_app_railway\"\n

\n

The inner limit, I understand \u2014 to avoid ticketless travel and booking on seeing the TC. But this is such a limited scenario that it basically just seems like a cruel way to inconvenience the majority.<\/p>\n

UTS App<\/p>\n<\/figcaption>\n<\/figure>\n\n\u201cAh, I\u2019m smart\u201d, you say. \u201cI\u2019ll just use a GPS spoofer, haha!\u201d. Well, I have news for you…\n\n

\"uts_app_railway\"\n

\n

At this point, you\u2019ll realise that these guys not only know what a GPS spoofer is, but also have the engineering chops to block it.<\/p>\n

UTS App<\/p>\n<\/figcaption>\n<\/figure>\n\nAt this point, you\u2019ll realise that these guys not only know what a GPS<\/a> spoofer is, but also have the engineering chops to block it. And now remember they decided to do that instead of improving the several other bugs.\n\nWelcome to India\u2019s most evil app, ladies and gentlemen.\n\nThere\u2019s more. While most apps try their best to separate you from your money, UTS is refreshingly anti-capitalistic. Forget the frequent payment failures (whose colourful details litter the app\u2019s reviews<\/a>), there are some inexplicable peculiarities like not being able to book more multiple first-class tickets at once, or book multiple route season tickets.\n\nOh, and meanwhile, it takes a needlessly long number of steps to book anything at all, and if there\u2019s a server issue\/payment<\/a> failure along the way (there will be!) you will need to start all over again. Diabolical! By this time, if your auto reaches the station, you\u2019ll need to find that sweet spot where you are geographically permitted to book the ticket!\n\nBut the best \u2014\u00a0or most evil \u2014\u00a0feature, I reserve for the last: You can\u2019t log onto the app from multiple devices.\n\nFair enough, you say, that\u2019s for security and preventing sharing.\n\nYou need to deregister on the first phone.\n\nAgain, alright\u2026 Kinda makes sense, though if you lose your phone that can get tricky.\n\nYou can\u2019t deregister if you have an active ticket. Okay, that makes sense, I suppose.\n\nBut then here\u2019s the kicker \u2014 a season ticket counts as an active ticket!\n\n

So you technically can\u2019t change your device unless your season ticket expires.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\nSo you technically can\u2019t change your device unless your season ticket expires. You have two options: Cart around your old phone JUST for the season ticket (as I did), or buy a new SIM for the new phone<\/a> and buy a fresh season ticket, forsaking the old one. I thought this was an old issue, but turns out in February of 2020, a decade when the rest of the world is talking about 5G<\/a>, neural networks and artificial intelligence, we have this:\n\n

\"uts_app_railway_review\"\n

\n

You have two options: Cart around your old phone JUST for the season ticket (as I did), or buy a new SIM for the new phone and buy a fresh season ticket, forsaking the old one.<\/p>\n

UTS App<\/p>\n<\/figcaption>\n<\/figure>\n\nAnd as for losing your phone \u2014 well, good luck.\n\nWhat\u2019s more, UTS has decided to make an already clunky app even more ponderous by putting in ads. Which makes sense for free ad-supported apps, but, as some reviews point out \u2014 why ads on what is essentially a government app, that too, one designed to make money<\/a> off tickets?\n\nOf course, I could list down several hundred more reasons why this app is a bad one, but I\u2019ve just decided to stick to the features that make it decidedly evil. So the next time you see someone staring at their phone, yelling into the air, moving bit by bit further away from the station, go put a hand on their shoulder, empathise<\/a> and advise them to buy a paper ticket from the queue instead!\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When you first download the Indian Railways\u2019 UTS app, you\u2019ll notice that there are a few truly ingenious features that must have taken some skill to deploy. The only problem \u2014 this skill has been used to aid frustration rather than convenience.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":362,"featured_media":6237,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[197],"tags":[10262,10263,996,10264,10265],"class_list":["post-6232","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-technology","tag-gps","tag-indian-railway","tag-mumbai-local","tag-ticketing","tag-uts"],"yoast_head":"\nOff the Rails: Why the Indian Railways\u2019 UTS App is Pure Evil<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"When you first download the Indian Railways\u2019 UTS app, you\u2019ll notice that there are a few truly ingenious features that must have taken some skill to deploy. The only problem \u2014 this skill has been used to aid frustration rather than convenience.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/?p=6232\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Off the Rails: Why the Indian Railways\u2019 UTS App is Pure Evil\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"When you first download the Indian Railways\u2019 UTS app, you\u2019ll notice that there are a few truly ingenious features that must have taken some skill to deploy. The only problem \u2014 this skill has been used to aid frustration rather than convenience.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/?p=6232\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Arr\u00e9\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2016-06-21T19:29:22+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-07-17T16:35:07+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/13.201.39.237\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/07\/1581568959.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"1520\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"850\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Deepak Gopalakrishnan\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"Off the Rails: Why the Indian Railways\u2019 UTS App is Pure Evil\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"When you first download the Indian Railways\u2019 UTS app, you\u2019ll notice that there are a few truly ingenious features that must have taken some skill to deploy. 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