Transportation plays an imperative role in economic growth. Moreover, a well-organized transport sector is characterized by how people, goods and services are moved from one place to another in a speedily and efficient fashion. Nairobi provides a varied public transportation means of getting in and out of the city; some of these motorized transport means include buses, matatus, rick shaws, motor bikes, taxis, and limited commuter train.
About 10 percent of the revenue generated in public transport sector is lost. The income loss is attributable to staff theft, corrupt practices, inadequate bookkeeping procedures and other operational expenditures. Likewise, the commuters are exposed to risk of carrying cash, arbitrary hiked fares and delay. To reduce these exposures a cashless payment system needs to be adopted to improve efficiency and accountability in public transport sector.
A survey carried within PSVs in Nairobi to access the type of phones owned and mobile operating systems available indicated that: nearly 78% of the respondents own a smart phone. In addition, most respondents particularly the commuters were receptive to use of a mobile application to pay fare (87%) and Android platform was found to be common. Consequently, the study determines a suitable mobile solution that was developed using Water Fall Model, which is a simple implementation approach, requires minimal resources and its preferred where quality is paramount. A third party subjected the mobile solution to functional test which ascertained that various mobile functions worked as expected. The mobile application was also subject to rigorous quality assurance test which showed that software metric such as reliability, speed, scalability and accuracy were upheld. Results based on post-test indicated that there was a high user satisfaction on the solution on aspects such as usability and user experience.
The mobile application also known as “KommutePal” runs on a platform that takes advantage of the readily existing infrastructure and overcomes the challenges in cash payment method to improve accountability and reduce risks associated with the said system.