And now, prepaid for power, gas, insurance8230;

With 50,000 terminals across India, Oxigen Services India, is all set to provide...

With 50,000 terminals across India, Oxigen Services India, is all set to provide consumers with prepaid options in sectors like power and gas. This IT-enabled multi-services platform for distribution and bill payments, plans to introduce new services, besides its already existing ones, including prepaid options in insurance, travel and cinema.

8220;We plan to expand the number of our touch points to 250,000 by 2010,8221; said Pramod Saxena, chairman and managing director, Oxigen. 8220;The intention is to have a single point access for every service that is used on a continuous basis and be a convenient service provider. Which is why this agreement with Microsoft where Microsoft bought a 37 per cent equity stake in Oxigen, announced today will help us scale up our operations,8221;he said.

Currently, Oxigen handles aggregation of recharge, bill payments and subscriptions for leading telecom operators, internet service providers, direct to home TV Dish and Tata Sky, prepaid radio Worldspace, prepaid value added services MobiBuzz as well as railway and airline ticketing on a single platform.

According to Saxena, the latest offering from Oxigen will be Oxicash, a virtual wallet. Oxicash, which has already been introduced in a limited way, is a service linked to a user8217;s mobile number, which serves like his account number. A four-digit security code is provided to the user, who can deposit cash at any Oxigen touch point. This money can then be used for any of the available Oxigen services and the balance will be accordingly deducted from the user8217;s account.

Another service in the pipeline is a prepaid system in power and gas, for which negotiations with service providers are on, Saxena said. The model for prepaid services in the power sector aims at working on convenience. The user updates his payment record at an Oxigen terminal, after which the power service provider instantly credits his account with a surplus of the same amount. Also on Oxigen8217;s agenda is the introduction of booking unreserved railway tickets, apart from making railway reservations on the web through IRCTC. 8220;An Oxigen terminal can be placed anywhere. It is especially useful to those who do not have credit cards to make online payments or are unwilling to directly use their bank accounts,8221; said Saxena. 8220;It, thus, acts as a convenient cash collection point.8221;