Fair Price Stores in Salem Will Get New Biometric PoS Devices

The Department of Civil Supplies has distributed new biometric point of sale (PoS) devices with 4G SIM card and printer to all shops at fair prices in the district.

To get products like dal, rice and sugar from stores at fair prices, a family member has to register his or her fingerprint on a biometric device integrated with the point-of-sale machine. However, public opinion raised allegations that the biometric device often did not work properly and items could not be collected. In many places, due to server problems, the device did not receive the correct signal. The public called on the government to address this issue.

Based on the demand, the Tamil Nadu government has announced that biometric devices in fair price shops will be replaced with new ones through Taluk supply officials. As announced, in the Salem district, officials collected old devices and, after installing new software on the devices, handed out new biometric PoS devices to employees.

Civil Supplies Department officials said that in Salem district, of the total 1,732 ration shops, 1,541 have PoS machines. Of those 1,541 stores, a total of 1,233 Fair Price Store employees received new devices on May 23. The old device was equipped with a 2G SIM card, which caused problems in many stores. The new device has a 4G SIM card and a printer. So there will be no problems with the server. Officials say the remaining 308 fair price stores will receive the new devices soon.