Urban planner and transportation consultant Vivek Pai said, "I welcome the move. However, being a government entity, it will be ideal to use BHIM UPI and Swadeshi Apps. Though this is a welcome step towards cashless payment the procedure adopted seems to be clumsy and time-consuming."

City transport expert Ajit V Shenoy said, "It is better to have pre-paid cards which you show at a contactless card reader during entry and exit which will deduct the fare. You should be able to buy the card either from a depot or a conductor and a conductor should have the authority to recharge these cards using a handheld device in multiples of Rs 100."

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mid-day reported on Wednesday on how the BEST, with piles of coins and loose change, finally moved in the direction of UPI cashless transactions with bus conductors now being given QR code scanner badges that can be scanned by commuters. Long due, but now done at two bus depots on an experimental basis, the process is slowly paving the way for cashless transactions to avoid an exchange of physical money in these days of COVID-19.

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