Daily Excelsior...Business

Petrol would be cheaper with 1996 APM proposal ......

World Bank delivers warning on e-governance failures .....

Transactions hit in SBI strike ......

Railways to introduce e-ticketing in Shatabdis .....

Air Sahara to induct wide-bodied planes for
overseas operations

HYDERABAD, Nov 5: Air Sahara plans to induct wide-bodied aircrafts for medium and long haul routes once the Government allows private airlines to fly to destinations in ASEAN and Europe.

Company’s president Rono J Dutta said today that leasing of boeing 767, boeing 777 and airbus 330 is being considered to expand the current fleet.

At present, the airline has 20 planes B 737-400s, 737-700s and 737-800s besides CRJ 200 jets offering 120 flights daily to 22 destinations in India and two abroad: Kathmandu and Colombo.

We will opt for the leasing route and use B 737-800s for flying to destinations like Bangkok, Singapore and Kuala Lumpur, Mr Dutta said. When the Government permission comes in, we will take a lead time of about four months to start operations.

For the London slot, the lead time may be six months, Mr Dutta said. We plan to fly from two or three Indian cities to all these destinations. The secondary choice will be to connect Birmingham and Manchester which have a lot of Indian population.

The wide-bodied planes B 767s, B 777s and A 330s — will be used in destinations in Britain.

Due to surging passenger traffic in and out of India and plenty of start-up carriers announcing future plans in Asia Pacific, lease rentals have gone up 30 per cent in the year-on period.

In October last year, former Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee had announced opening up of Indian skies for airlines of ASEAN countries to boost trade and tourism in a major way. The liberal policy was aimed at allowing major carriers like Singapore airlines, Cathay Pacific, Thai Airways and Malaysian Airlines to tap the Indian market without restrictions.

The tourist traffic between India and ASEAN countries has been growing at 16 to 18 per cent annually in recent times.

With Air India (AI) and Indian Airlines (IA) having 100-odd aircraft, nearly 80 per cent of three million tourists come to India on foreign carriers.

The Civil Aviation Ministry is currently in the process of finalising necessary guidelines for private operators like Jet Airways and Air Sahara which have already put in their applications. Both airlines want to fly to Singapore, Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur to begin with.

Industry sources say both Jet and Sahara are already in the market, scouting for wide-bodied planes.

As of now, domestic private airlines already fly to SAARC destinations like Colombo and Kathmandu. Dhaka will soon be added to their route map. Besides, they are also preparing themselves for Government’s permission to fly to other international destinations in the United States, Europe and the Gulf. (UNI)

Reliance appeals against High Courts order

NEW DELHI, Nov 5: Reliance today appealed against the Delhi High Court’s dismissal of its plea seeking a restraint on BSNL for blocking its calls.

A division bench of Justice Vijender Jain and Justice Anil Kumar will hear the plea later today.

Delhi High Court yesterday dismissed the plea of Reliance Infocomm seeking a restraint on BSNL blocking its calls at 30 cities, including Mumbai, Pune and Chennai, for failing to pay for illegal routing of international calls through local lines.

Justice Vikramajit Sen dismissed Reliance’s plea against BSNL running up a bill of about Rs 254 crore on Reliance and threatening to block Reliance calls if the amount was not paid by tomorrow. (UNI)

No child labour in firework industry: AIFFWA, TANFAMA

CHENNAI, Nov 5: Declaring that there was no child labour in the firework manufacturing units at Sivakasi, which accounts for 95 per cent of the country’s total firework production, the industry has favoured the cancellation of licence of any factory that is found employing children.

Talking to reporters here last night, representatives of the All India Federation of Fireworks Association (AIFFWA) and Tamil Nadu Fireworks and Amorces Manufacturers’ Assocation (TANFAMA) denied repeated claims of various NGOs about the prevalence of child labour in the ‘hazardous’ fireworks manufacturing industry.

"The NGOs are surfacing and making such claims only during the Deepavali festival. What are they doing for the remaining eleven months," (AIFFWA) general secretary A M S G Ashokan and (TANFAMA) general secretary S Ratnagiri asked.

The manufacturers had given it in writing to the district collector and other authorities to cancel the licences once and for all if the authorities found any child labour in firework manufacturing units, they said.

"We will quit the business. The authorities are free to take action against the units which employ children. We want to enforce it strictly. There is no need to suspend the licence of the factory as punishment. They can cancel it once and for all," they added.

"There is no point in talking about it. It has been said for the last 25 years. You (media) please come to our factories and see for yourself," they added.

However, they admitted that parents, who were working in factories, had been utilising their school-going children for ancillary jobs like making tubes (rolling papers) at their homes where no chemicals were used.

"That too. The children are assisting them only after they return from school. They are paid Rs 300 per week if they assist their parents for a couple of hours per day. It’s totally non-hazarduous."

"The factories do not come under the picture. Normally such ancillary works are given as contract to sub-contractors who in turn hand over the work to people in their household."

"It is the parents who are utilising the assistance of their children for such small works. There are 25 such ancilliary works associated with it and no chemical substance is involved in these works," Mr Ashokan claimed.

Firework units provided direct employment to 50,000 workers in and around Sivakasi and indirect employment to 1.5 lakh people, Mr Ashokan said.

He said about 32,000 children in Sivakasi, having a population of one lakh, were going to schools. The industry had set up numerous schools and colleges in and around sivakasi, which had 40 schools, two arts colleges, one women’s college, two engineering colleges, two polytechnics, four industrial training institutes and a pharma college.

During the last 25 years, the Virudhunagar district was the number one in the state as far as education was concerned. The top rank holder in 2002 exams hailed from Sivakasi, they pointed out.

The literacy level in the district, especially Sivakasi, was high and considering the almost nil drop out rate, there was no truth in the NGOs claim about prevalence of child labour in firework manufacturing units, Mr Ashokan and Mr Ratnagiri claimed. (UNI)

Get ready for a Deepavali which is less
polluting, more eco-friendly

CHENNAI, Nov 5: This year’s festival of lights will be less noisy and polluting and more eco-friendly, the All India Federation of Fireworks Association (AIFFWA) has said.

AIFFWA general secretary A M S G Ashokan and Tamil Nadu Fireworks and Amorces Manufacturers’ Assocation (TANFAMA) general secretary S Ratnagiri told newspersons here last night that as per the norms prescribed by the national sound level committee, constituted by the Central Government, the sound level of crackers would not exceed 125 decibels.

"As we have controlled the sound at the production level itself, the level will not exceed the prescribed limit," they said. The decibel level was also being frequently monitored by the department of explosives through periodic inspections.

"All the crackers before being packed are subjected to thorough testing (for noise level) both by the manufacturers and the department of explosives," they said.

Mr Ashokan and Ratnagiri said since all the 800-odd units in the country, including a major chunk of the nearly 600 units in and around Sivakasi, India’s nerve centre of fireworks manufacturing, had shifted to use of gun powder from metal powder this year the noise level would be significantly less. This would also help in reducing the air pollution by 50 per cent, making it more eco-friendly.

Mr Ratnagiri and Mr Ashokan said "over the last two years, we have gradually stopped manufacturing noisy crackers like atom bombs." They pointed out that the availability of smaller sized atom bombs were the left overs of what was manufactured last year.

"Normally we used 15 to 20 gms of chemical content earlier. It has been brought down by eight to ten gms, which means there is 50 to 60 per cent less chemical content. But the effect (sound) is the same."

"The reduction in chemical content not only reduces noise pollution but also makes fireworks more eco-friendly," they observed.

Of the Rs 800 crore Indian fireworks industry, the ratio of sound crackers and non-sound crackers like sparklers, flower pots and chakras stood at 60:40, a couple of years back.

"But once the negative campaign was launched by some NGOs about the sound level and "say no to fireworks", the ratio had turned vice-versa over the last four years. Now the ratio of sound crackers and non-sound crackers is 40:60," they claimed.

Mr Ratnagiri attributed the reason for this phenomenal change to the varying taste of the discerning customers, who were looking for new and colourful varieties.

"This prompted us to change from sound to colour and aerial display varieties about two years back. And the response is overwhelming. This not only ensures that the noise level is kept to the barest minimum but also makes the fireworks more eco-friendly."

"Festivals hereafter will paint the sky with multicolour cascades of bursting lights from fireworks as the skilled manufacturers of Sivakasi are using the latest technology avaialble with world leaders like China," Mr Ratnagiri said.

TANFAMA sources told UNI that the atmospheric pollution level on a full day of bursting crackers would be less than 0.01 per cent of the total pollution caused by smoke emanating from vehicles on the roads.

Various scientific data had proved that the pollution level was well within the permissible limits, the sources said and allayed fears that bursting crackers would lead to atmospheric pollution.

Talking about problems faced by the fireworks industry, Mr Ashokan said a majority of the 800-odd manufacturing units in the country were situated in the city of pyrotechniques (Sivakasi), which was hailed as ‘mini Japan’ by Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru.

About Rs five crore of the fireworks from Sivakasi was being exported to various countries like South Africa, United Kingdom and the United States.

Mr Ashokan said the production size at the international level was to the tune of Rs 10,000 crore, with China being the major player with Rs 5,000 to Rs 6,000 crore.

The United States, France, Spain and Italy accounted for about Rs 3,000 crore production and in India, it ranged from Rs 800 crore to Rs 1,000 crore.

He said the overall sale of fireworks had remained stagant at Rs 500 crore for the last few years though it had dipped to Rs 400 crore in 2000 due to problems of child labour raised by some NGOs.

From Rs 500 crore in 1999, it came down to Rs 400 crore in 2000, he said. "We have touched the Rs 500 crore market in 2003 and this year too we will achieve the same target," Mr Ashokan added.

To a question, he said there had been no significant rise in the prices of crackers over the years. "It was around five to ten per cent," he added. (UNI)

Inflation rises to 7.38 PC

NEW DELHI, Nov 5: After remaining unchanged for a week, inflation rose by 0.28 per cent to 7.38 per cent for the week ended October 23, mainly due to costlier vegetables, fuels and certain manufactured products.

The point-to-point Wholesale Price Index (WPI) inflation rose from 7.1 per cent even as the Reserve Bank expected it to be around 6.5 per cent this fiscal due to lingering concern over uncertain oil prices in the global markets.

The general price level was 5.13 per cent in the previous year period.

Market analysts believe the RBI’s rather modest inflation forecast could again be revised upwards on account of the steep hike in petroleum products prices effected from midnight last night and the serial upward revision in LPG prices every month till the subsidy on cooking gas was wiped out.

The WPI was up by 0.3 per cent to 189.1 points due to an all-round price hike for main commodities — primary articles, fuels and manufactured products, including edible oils. The index was 176.1 points in the year-ago period.

The WPI inflation of 8.33 per cent registered during the week ended August 28 actually turned out to be much lower than the final figure of 8.74 per cent since the former was only a provisional figure.

The final WPI stood corrected at 189.2 points during the last week of August as compared to the provisional mark of 188.5 points.

The index of primary articles’ group rose by 0.7 per cent to 191.8 points due to costlier food and non-food articles. The index was 182.8 points in the year-ago period.

Food articles’ group index rose by 0.5 per cent to 190 points due to higher prices for vegetables and eggs (four per cent each), poultry chicken (three per cent), jowar (two per cent) and moong and barley (one per cent).

Prices, however, declined in the case of maize (two per cent) and arhar, tea and urad (one per cent each).

The index of non-food articles’ group was up by 0.1 per cent to 187.7 points due to costlier raw silk (six per cent), raw rubber, gingelly seed & raw jute (two per cent each) and groundnut seed & sunflower (one per cent each).

But prices fell for niger seed (three per cent), safflower (two per cent) and castor seed, skins, sugarcane and cotton seed (one per cent each).

Minerals group index shot up by 9 per cent to 299.1 points due to higher prices for fire clay (20 per cent), iron ore (14 per cent), barytes (11 per cent), China clay (five per cent) and gypsum (four per cent).

However, chromites became cheaper by 52 per cent, magnesite by 25 per cent, steatite 14 per cent and fluorite (one per cent).

The index of fuel, power, light and lubricants’ group was up marginally by 0.2 per cent to 282.3 points due to five per cent hike in naphtha prices. It was 253.1 points in the year-ago period.

During the week under review, global oil prices vaulted to record new highs nearing 56 dollar a barrel due to winter demand in the northern hemisphere and China as also the us Presidential elections.

India had charged some of the oil producing nations and companies with building inventories that resulted in "unjustifiable" rise in crude prices globally, thereby affecting the economic growth of developing countries.

In view of soaring oil prices, inflation has been over 7 per cent since July and this prompted the RBI to hike the repo rate by 0.25 per cent to 4.75 per cent in its latest credit and monetary policy.

Manufactured products’ group index was up marginally by 0.1 per cent to 167.4 points due to costlier food products, chemicals, basic metals, machinery and transport equipment. The index was 156.4 points in the previous year period. (PTI)

Maritime security important for growing Int’l maritime trade

NEW DELHI, Nov 5: The increasing Reliance of sea as a conduit for passage of goods across the world, specially in critical areas like the Arabian Gulf and the Indian Ocean, mandates an increased attention to maritime security, a leading naval theorist said.

"Even at the end of the 20th century, most of the world’s goods continue to be traded by ship. Despite technological advances in transportation systems, prevailing winds, as well as ocean currents and predominant weather patterns, still determine the safest and most efficient trade routes," Professor Geoffrey till of London’s King’s College said at the Sardar Pannikar Memorial Lecture here.

"Maritime transport still remains the most inexpensive means of transporting bulk goods.Over 80 percent of the world’s trade involves ocean transit," he said, adding that with the globalisation of the world economy and the corresponding dependence of a greater number of nations on foreign trade, the security of global maritime trade remains as critical as ever.

Prof till said this raised "the important question of what is the strategic response by regional navies to ensure the safe and efficient carriage of these cargoes."

"Indeed, there are also countries outside the immediate region who are also dependent on secure shipping. Thus they too have a legitimate interest in fostering a regime of cooperation and calm. Some do not see military threats to this shipping because of the interdependence of all in the region on maritime trade. Reliance on such a notion however has obvious shortcomings. Rather than leave security management to chance it is in the interests of all to build a maritime security mechanism. Regional navies in have a vital role to play in determining their various strategies," he advocated.

Prof till, a renowed and prolific author of naval matters and maritime strategy, drew out how maritime affairs interact with the security situation in regions, such as the Asia-Pacific, the Mediterranean, the Gulf and the Indian Ocean, especially in relation to the growing threats of piracy and maritime terrorism.

Touching on piracy — another area of concern especially in south-east Asian waters — Prof till said that pirate attacks are increasing throughout the entire Caribbean sea, with attacks on shipping often aimed at seizing vessels for use in drug trafficking. Additional attacks have been reported in the Mediterranean and Black Seas. Most of the attacks in Asia and the Caribbean occurred while the ships or yachts were in transit the majority of the remainder were reported in territorial waters, while the ships were at anchor or berthed.

Maritime terrorism on the other hand is functionally different from maritime piracy, he said. "Pirate attacks occur for economic gain terrorist attacks occur for political or social gain. Terrorist attacks on ships - passenger, commercial and military - are not new. Attacks such as the one on the uss cole in 2000 have been cause for concern. Since September 11, this concern has increased. In the future, cruise ships are expected to be particularly vulnerable to maritime terrorism.

One of the greatest concerns regarding maritime terrorism stems from the transport of nuclear material at sea. The use of a ship as a weapon, in the manner of the World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks, is a troubling scenario,’’ he said.

"The problems of combating terrorism resemble those of combating piracy- identifying a priori those who intend to commit such acts and bringing to justice those responsible.

Additionally, maritime terrorist attacks and maritime pirate attacks are overwhelmingly likely to occur in a nation’s territorial waters, there remain significant sovereignty and jurisdictional problems with responding to foreign attacks. Effective response will require international coordination of coastal states and cooperative regional regimes to respond to and deter piracy and maritime terrorist attacks,’’ Prof till added.

Marine pollution is a major source of concern, he said.

For example, a supertanker’s cargo of crude oil settles during its delivery voyage and has to be washed out. This is often done by the unscrupulous in archipelagic waters. For a tanker carrying 100,000 tonnes of crude oil that is a discharge of 500 tonnes. One hundred ships per day through the area multiplies this figure to 50,000 tonnes per day being jettisoned into the sea anywhere between the Persian Gulf and north east Asia. The effect on local communities and traditional fishing villages could be catastrophic and thus has political and security consequences. (UNI)

NTPC stock lists at premium to issue price

MUMBAI, Nov 5: The scrip of National Thermal Power Corporation Ltd today witnessed heavy volumes after listing at a premium to the issue price on the Bombay and National Stock Exchanges.

On BSE, the first trade was struck at Rs 70 for 100 shares, while on the NSE it opened at Rs 88 and later moved down to trade around Rs 70 per share.

The scrip witnessed heavy trading on the BSE with current volume of traded shares pegged at 4.85 crore. The turnover of traded shares stood at Rs 349 crore, according to the trading data available with the exchange.

On the NSE, total traded volume was 11.36 crore shares with a turnover of Rs 814.17 crore.

The issue price was fixed at Rs 62 per share of Rs 10 each. The book-built issue of state-owned power generation company opened for bidding on October 7 and closed on October 14 2004.

The bidding price band for Initial Public Offering (IPO) was Rs 52-62 per share.

The public issue of 86,58,30,000 equity shares of Rs 10 each for cash consisted of a fresh issue of 43,29,15,000 equity shares and offer for sale of equal number of equity shares held by the Government of India.

The IPO was oversubscribed by about 12 times the issue size.

ICICI Securities Ltd, Enam Financial Consultants Ltd, Kotak Mahindra Capital Company Ltd are acting as lead managers for public offer. (PTI)

Petrol would be cheaper with 1996 APM proposal

NEW DELHI, Nov 5: Both petrol and diesel would have been available to consumers for around Rs 20 per-liter, if the Central Government would have implemented the 1996 proposal on dismantling Administered Pricing Mechanism (APM), which envisages maximum five per cent duty on petro products.

However, the LPG, CNG, PNG and kerosene would have been costing more to the consumers from the present level because international prices were much higher.

The political approach to cross-subsidise without sacrificing the revenue had resulted in higher transport fuels and also led to distorted prices of various products.

The main principle adopted in the first document on dismantling of APM in 1996 was that the duties on all petro products should not be more than five per cent as prices will be fixed in relation with international parity.

Agreeing that there were high rates of duties on petroleum products, Petroleum Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar said that if duties would have been zero, petrol and diesel to consumers would have been costing around Rs 17/18 per liter.

With prices zooming to an all time high, the current situation worsened further with the Government adopting a pricing formula, which was not really at the parity level in relation with international prices.

The complex pricing formula and high rate of duties are now hurting consumers more.

On the other side, revenue of Governments (both State and Central) and income of oil marketing companies shows that they were the main beneficiary in the post-apm at the cost of consumers particularly in the current phase, when prices in the international market were rising.

The Governments intention not to forgo or cut in its revenue was the major factor behind this all time high prices of all petroleum products. With demand of petroleum products in past ten years rising steeply, revenue from petroleum sector had projected to more than one lakh crore to Governments and profits of major oil companies, which was Rs 12,000 in pre-APM era, went up to Rs 30,000 plus last year.

While runaway rise in prices at international market was stated to be the main cause for spurt in retail prices in the domestic market, several consumers believe if rational pricing policies have been adopted by OMCs, prices would not have risen so sharply.

The existing pricing policy did not take into consideration the cost of production of each product as well as productivity level of each company, which normally taken into consideration for determining the prices for such sensitive commodities.

Efforts shown by the Government on his part to contain prices by way of reduction in duties nominally and changes in the pricing formula also failed as under-recoveries in the first half of current financial year rose to Rs 10,000 crore and likely to cross Rs 20,000 crore, if prices would not have revised yesterday night.

The Government, which takes into account the custom duty while determining prices for consumers, would have reduced duty on all major products so that the impact on consumers would have been minimum, several consumers believes.

They suggested, if customs duty on petrol and diesel are reduced to zero, prices in the domestic market will reduce considerably and under-recoveries of omcs will also declined and Government revenue would not be affected because both products are not being imported at present.

Officials said when APM was dismantled in April 2002, the industry urged the Government to fix retail prices on basis of import parity of products and inland prices should have included freight from ports and custom duty also. The Government agreed to the industry demand of fixing retail prices on the basis of import parity level.

The scheme was successful in the initial period but when the prices zoomed further because of tension in the Middle East, the system collapsed. ONGC and GAIL were asked to share under-recoveries and prices remained freezed for a quite long period in the first part of current year. LPG and kerosene prices remained frozen till yesterday, when the Government allowed Rs 20 per cylinder increase. However, the freeze on kerosene continued as the domestic fuel was used by the poor to prepare food.

The problem of industry as well as Government reached to flash point, when prices of crude soared to more than 40 dollars. The Government was forced again to formulate a new pricing scheme and given more freedom to omcs and as a result, they had revised prices three times in past one month but the scheme could not be translated in reality because prices continued to rise in the international markets.

"Even the new pricing scheme seems to have failed in providing relief to consumers", officials said and added that the basic issues were not addressed by the Government.

Nearly 54 per cent of retail price is taken away by the Government as various levies while the remaining to the oil companies. Even the composition of retail selling price is under dispute, as many believe that components taken into consideration were favoring the industry.

"Moreover conditions in the past two years have also changed and refining margins in the international markets went up sharply," they pointed out.

The definition of import parity of product is also loaded in favour of stand alone refineries because under the existing formula, the omcs take into account the cost, freight, insurance, custom duty applicable for products besides, other charges like bank, ocean loss and wharfages.

On one side, the industry wants to be competitive with international companies but on the other side, it wants a component of custom duty as a protection, which results in higher landed cost , officials said and admitted and added the consumers prices increase sharply because of the existing pricing formula. (UNI)

World Bank delivers warning on e-governance failures

BANGALORE, Nov 5: A senior World Bank official today came up with a sobering assessment of e-governance initiatives worldwide, saying implementation of projects had been hampered by excessive attention to technology even as flawed Government processes remained unchanged.

"Around the world one sees more evidence of failure or partial success than actual breakthrough accomplishments in e-governance. In many cases, Governments are still focussing on automating existing processes and moving existing services online - yet this is simply paving the cowpath," World Bank lead informatics specialist Robert Schware said at a seminar on e-governance organised as part of BangaloreIT.Com.

"It is estimated that approximately 35 per cent of e-government projects in developing countries are total failures, approximately 50 per cent are partial failures - only some 15 per cent can be fully seen as successes. There are equal number of very sad statistics about the number of failed implementations in the United States and Europe," he said.

In India, he said that the World Bank was monitoring about 200 pilot projects on e-governance and of these only 110 were scalable and capable of replication.

The primary reason for the deficiencies in e-governance projects was that they were over-reliant on technology as the driving force for success while internal processes remained unaltered.

"The e-component of these services often amounts to no more than electronic versions of the stack of pamphlets available in Government offices."

The future success of e-governance projects, Mr Schware observed, would depend in large part on the ability to learn from failures and adopt mechanisms for structured monitoring and evaluation.

"As a starting point, I would suggest that more metrics be used in e-government strategies and consequently in monitoring and evaluation. Typically reviews may be done on an annual or bi-annual basis."

The provisional findings of a study by the World Bank of 40 e-governance projects worldwide had shown that almost none of them had a measurement and monitoring mechanism in place.

"We must be realistic in our expectations and learn from failures when they occur," he stated. (UNI)

Transactions hit in SBI strike

NEW DELHI, Nov 5: More than 200,000 employees and officers of the State Bank of India today observed a countrywide token strike in protest against the "anti-labour" policies of the management.

The All India State Bank Officers Federation and All India State Bank of India Staff Federation, which had given the call for the strike, described the strike as a "complete success."

"No transaction took place in any of the 9,000 branches of SBI," said SBI officers association (Delhi circle) general secretary T N Goel.

The leaders of both the federations will meet in Mumbai on Sunday to chalk out their further course of action.

The unions are demanding appointment on compassionate grounds of family members of employees who die in harness, welfare fund and reduction of interest rates on staff loans.

Other demands include compensation to employees working on holidays and withdrawal of outsourcing of bank work. (UNI)

Railways to introduce e-ticketing in Shatabdis

NEW DELHI, Nov 5: In yet another customer friendly step, Indian railways plan to introduce e-ticketing as a pilot scheme on selected Shatabdi Express trains by allowing the passengers to print their own tickets.

The move is intended to do away with the hard tickets.

E-ticketing will lead to decongestion of the computerised Passenger Reservation System (PRS) counters, besides enabling the passengers to buy tickets upto the time of charting of reservations, which was not presently available on the internet ticketing system, an official release said.

Under the e-ticketing scheme, passengers will also not be required to cancel waitlist tickets, as they will be cancelled automatically and the amount due will be refunded electronically to the passenger’s account. (UNI)