Casestudy Tolling System

Toll Management System For Transurban

Brief on the client:

Client: Transurban
Industry: Toll Road Investor and Owner-Operator
Subject: Toll Management System
On the Web: www.transurban.com.au

The client was Transurban Group, a toll road owner-operator and investor with interests in Australia and the US. The client is a Top 50 company on the Australian Securities Exchange and its focus is on partnering with governments to deliver roads that meet community needs over the long term.

The client operates expressways across Australia and during the process of automation and modernization of its toll posts; there was a need to put in a system that would interact with all the integrated hardware components and the software components real-time.

Challenges:

There were plenty of challenges upfront in order to build a system that would meet the client’s expectations:

  1. The toll management system needed integration with a lot of components (both hardware and software) where the data was critical and the processing had to happen real-time.
  2. The system had to be used by a large number of motorists, so there was zero scope of failure or problems. Losing an entire day of data would amount to huge losses not limited to just the monetary losses.
  3. The then existent communication between various motorways happened through daily emails rather than real-time, which had its own set of flaws.
  4. The existing system in place did not have enough capabilities to interact with the new and emerging technologies efficiently.
  5. The new system had to be developed in such a way that it would be highly scalable, in order to be aligned with the client’s business expansion plans.
  6. The system was expected to deliver very high performance from the very beginning.

Astra Galaxy I.T. solutions approach:

Astra Galaxy took up the endeavour to deliver end-to-end services for the project. The services offered to the client included Consulting services as well as application production, with activities beginning from project feasibility to maintenance and support.

The team comprised of XX development specialists and XX Quality assurance professionals with 1 project manager managing the project activities.

It took about X months to come up with the first working solution that the client had asked for. The solution kept evolving with addition of new products that Astra Galaxy developed and integrated with the initial system.

Although there was a lot of effort and smart work that went into the solutioning, the solution not only met but also exceeded the client’s expectations as it countered all the challenges effectively and successfully. The solution was so successful that it was used by the organization’s other motorways too. The solution also turned out to be a milestone in interoperability across Australian motorways.

To know more about these products and how we used our Application Development and Delivery (note: refer to the last section for this approach) to develop the system, please contact us at info@astragalaxy.com.

The final result and client experience:

The final application that came out had multiple features like:

  • Seamless integration with the toll plaza hardware and software.
  • Information flow between various components of the system and the interaction with the server real-time and flawless.
  • Very high uptime as the system was up and running for 99.9% of the time with its 24 * 7 mission critical nature.
  • Very high on scalability and integration capabilities. Introduction of interoperability with other motorways was as a result of this system.
  • The system could handle high amount of transactions and data processing. The system would very easily perform up to 100,000 transactions a day.
  • The system met the requirement of a zero bug tolerance.
  • Another component of the system that interacted with the bank was not only safe and secure but it also maintained data privacy and integrity at all times.
  • There was seamless integration with the existing system after a detailed analysis and study was conducted on the existing one.
  • The system was high on usability, while it also offered collaboration.
  • The reporting was extensive and dynamic because the system was exhaustive and detailed.

The subsequent products developed and integrated by us, turned out to be highly successful which delivered huge direct/indirect profits for the client.

Online account management: The user could apply for a new tag through our online system. The tag was then shipped to the user’s physical address. S/he could then manage her/his online tag account, which also brought in a lot of new business for the client.

  • Visitor epass: A highlight of this system was that the vehicles did not need a tag to pass through the toll plaza. There was an OCR in place which would record and decipher the vehicle’s registration number real-time and charge the vehicle’s motorway account every time it passed.
  • Mobile tolling: Very convenient system for quick visitors. In this case the mobile’s provider charged them for the tags, by allowing them to pay through their mobile phones. A hugely successful product with the visitors.
  • IVR system: The IVR system in place was basically meant to facilitate and manage customer care operations, which subsequently allowed a user to perform many other account related activities as well.