TNN | Oct 2, 2012, 04.24AM IST
Though 45 FP shops in nine circles were identified to roll out the service, the civil supplies department on Day One launched the initiative at 11 public distribution system (PDS) outlets.
Glitches were reported at FP shops in Malakpet, Shah Ali Banda, Nampally, Kacheguda, Amberpet, Borabanda and Warasiguda.
At a fair price shop at Swaraj Nagar in Borabanda, white ration cardholders had to wait for over one-and-half hours due to a technical snag in the e-POS device.
The FP dealer completed five transactions through the device, but later it failed to connect to the server. As a result, other cardholders had to wait for over an hour to by the essentials.
"We alerted Unique Identification Authority of India (UIAD) representatives in Hyderabad. They came and found that the device was not working due to an antenna problem. They changed the antenna and we started delivering goods," assistant supplies officer, civil supplies department, M Raghurami Reddy told TOI.
The device uses cardholder's fingerprint as proof and once it matches with the online data, a receipt is given to the cardholder with details of drawal of commodities, quantities and price, he said.
When contacted, Hyderabad district supplies officer (DSO) V Rajasekhar said, "We encountered some technical problems today. We took the issue to the notice of the UIAD authorities. After fixing the problem, the new system will be rolled out across the city."
The aim of introducing e-POS devices is to ensure goods reach actual beneficiaries and also to control irregularities in PDS network.