Delhi-Jaipur Highway Commuters Forced To Pay Cash At Toll Plazas Due To Technical Glitches In FASTag System 

Technical errors are troubling commuters having FASTag accounts at the toll plaza on the Delhi-Jaipur highway. Motorists have alleged that these glitches meant that they were asked to pay cash in spite of having adequate balance in their FASTag accounts.

Others complain that they are forced to pay twice the toll fee in cash in one of the gates since the tag does not seem to be working properly. Gurugram resident Raghuvendra Shukla was halted at the Kherki Daula toll plaza as he was travelling to the national capital.

Shukla was told by the booth operator that his FASTag account was ‘unreadable’ and hence he was charged Rs 130, which included a penalty too.

“As soon as I crossed the toll gate, I received a message on my phone that the same amount was deducted from my FASTag account,” the individual was quoted by the Times of India.

Shukla asked the booth officials to return his money but he was in turn told to contact his FASTag operator for reimbursement. The electronic toll collection system has been introduced to cut out manual intervention in the same and accordingly reduce queues at toll plazas too. However, some technical issues seem to be hampering that objective at certain places across the country.

One of the officials of the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) said, “It is a new system and thus, it will take time to settle. It is especially affecting those people who bought the FASTag from an online platform.”

Problems with the RFID reader, incorrect camera placement, dust on FASTag along with insufficient account balance were said to be some of the reasons behind the current issues.