The M50 Barrier Free Tolling Thread

mamakevf

Bond-007 wrote: »

I read somewhere they have something like 20,000 numberplate misreads per day.

Maybe the camera isn't quick enough

Sizzler

2nd Row Donkey wrote: »

I'm up in court on monday the 19th Oct - in 5 days time for 5 unapid tolls back in april, they are looking for €948 quid.

I dont have a tag or a video account I just paid afterwards or when I got the letter saying I owed €6.

I definetly did not get subsequent letters about €46 fines on top of the original €6 or any previous letters from the solicitors requiring a payment of €140 that some other people on here appeared to have recieved. The 1st I knew about it was the letter with the court appearance date.

Haven't got a solictor to come with me but I'll take my chances on the day.

Anyone got any advice.

P.S. .. on the chances that the Judge imposes the fine on the day - when do I have to pay it by?

I'll put it this way - I WONT have €950 with me on Monday, in fact I won't have anywhere close to that. I could but i'm intentionally not bringing any money as i want to see what happens.

So what happens then? should I bring an over night bag in case I end up in Hotel MountJoy

Seriously - if the Judge gives me the option between paying those ***** in tralee or doing time/community service/suspended sentence etc, then I'll take any one of the latter options.

How did you get on mate? Hopefully all went OK

2nd Row Donkey

Sizzler wrote: »

How did you get on mate? Hopefully all went OK

6 months in the slammer doing hard time! Only joking.

Well, I turned up and went to court 49 along with about 200 other people who where all there for the same reason as me! MR X XXXXX vs NRA

The fines ranged from €150 for using the toll road once and not paying to some people who had fines ranging between €3k-€6k!!! (Not sure how many unpaid tolls that work out at - about 30-60 i reckon)

Posted on the door of court room 49 was a list 3 pages long of people who had returned the letter informing the solicitors in Tralee that they "intended to defend" - I wasn’t one of those people so my name wasn’t on the list. Instead I was herded off with about another 120 to the outside of court room number 40.

Court room 40 and two side rooms beside courtroom 40 each contained representatives from the solicitors in Tralee.
- Without much explanation you basically queued up on a first come first served basis to meet these solicitors and haggle over how much you where prepared to pay.

The general rule of thumb appeared to be about half your original fine, although this wasn’t always the case. One guy from Tralee appeared to more lenient then the others so once this was realised everyone started to queue outside his door!!

Some people where able to haggle a bit better than 50% off - (or so they claimed when they came out of the negotiation process). Others didn’t get much of a discount, one guy I spoke to owed approx €750 but only got €150 off.

Some people came in and out of the negotiations a few times before agreeing on a final payment. Anyone unemployed seemed to be in contact with MABS and based on MABS advice they agreed a fee (which often seemed to be much less then the original fine) - they also got a much longer period to pay the repayments back - which is only fair.

For the rest of us, it was generally 50% off the original fee and pay within 2-3 weeks.

It was funny to see people standing outside saying "no way am i paying these ***** €600quid, I paid my f**king tolls etc"... Then 5 mins later they were delighted to come out of the room having agreed to pay €300-400 quid.

I myself owed them €950 for 6 unpaid tolls (not 5 as I previously stated - shows how much attention I paid to it)

I decided while standing outside that if they made me an offer of around the €200 mark, I'd take it.
In the end they offered to reduce it to €274.34.

I argued my case back and forth for a few mins before they mentioned some other outstanding tolls that are unpaid from July and currently "pending prosecution" - I agreed to pay the full €274.34 if they cleared those July tolls and then I signed on the dotted line.
.

Our man in Havana

Ya gotta love the civil law.

Seth Brundle

If they were so confident that they were in the right, why try to settle?

niceirishfella

kbannon wrote: »

If they were so confident that they were in the right, why try to settle?

To keep it away from the Bench.

Seth Brundle

...thus indicating that they are not confident of a win!
I wonder why?

niceirishfella

kbannon wrote: »

...thus indicating that they are not confident of a win!
I wonder why?

Hmmmmm, yeah agreed.
It'd be nice to know if one did go to the bench, what the outcome is?
Anyone know for sure from a person who went before one of the wig wearers?

Sizzler

2nd Row Donkey wrote: »

6 months in the slammer doing hard time! Only joking.

Well, I turned up and went to court 49 along with about 200 other people who where all there for the same reason as me! MR X XXXXX vs NRA

The fines ranged from €150 for using the toll road once and not paying to some people who had fines ranging between €3k-€6k!!! (Not sure how many unpaid tolls that work out at - about 30-60 i reckon)

Posted on the door of court room 49 was a list 3 pages long of people who had returned the letter informing the solicitors in Tralee that they "intended to defend" - I wasn’t one of those people so my name wasn’t on the list. Instead I was herded off with about another 120 to the outside of court room number 40.

Court room 40 and two side rooms beside courtroom 40 each contained representatives from the solicitors in Tralee.
- Without much explanation you basically queued up on a first come first served basis to meet these solicitors and haggle over how much you where prepared to pay.

The general rule of thumb appeared to be about half your original fine, although this wasn’t always the case. One guy from Tralee appeared to more lenient then the others so once this was realised everyone started to queue outside his door!!

Some people where able to haggle a bit better than 50% off - (or so they claimed when they came out of the negotiation process). Others didn’t get much of a discount, one guy I spoke to owed approx €750 but only got €150 off.

Some people came in and out of the negotiations a few times before agreeing on a final payment. Anyone unemployed seemed to be in contact with MABS and based on MABS advice they agreed a fee (which often seemed to be much less then the original fine) - they also got a much longer period to pay the repayments back - which is only fair.

For the rest of us, it was generally 50% off the original fee and pay within 2-3 weeks.

It was funny to see people standing outside saying "no way am i paying these ***** €600quid, I paid my f**king tolls etc"... Then 5 mins later they were delighted to come out of the room having agreed to pay €300-400 quid.

I myself owed them €950 for 6 unpaid tolls (not 5 as I previously stated - shows how much attention I paid to it)

I decided while standing outside that if they made me an offer of around the €200 mark, I'd take it.
In the end they offered to reduce it to €274.34.

I argued my case back and forth for a few mins before they mentioned some other outstanding tolls that are unpaid from July and currently "pending prosecution" - I agreed to pay the full €274.34 if they cleared those July tolls and then I signed on the dotted line.
.

Fair play mate, thanks for posting your story. Glad it had some sort of positive outcome for you anyway

As a few of the lads have pointed out already, why didnt they haul all these 200 people into court and go for broke if they were so confident of winning? I would love to know the outcome of the guys who actually challenged the fines and where they got to.

The moral of the story above seems to be they wont actually bring you to court, they just frighten people right to the doorsteps of the court but dont have the balls or the actual law underpiining this whole farce is not robust enough for them to do so. You can readily expect a huge discount or just tell them you are up to your bollix in debt and can't afford [insert random number here] and they can sod off.

Our man in Havana

Well actually a judge could direct them to try and settle. The defendant could simply tell them to go inside and fight it out.

Sizzler

niceirishfella wrote: »

Hmmmmm, yeah agreed.
It'd be nice to know if one did go to the bench, what the outcome is?
Anyone know for sure from a person who went before one of the wig wearers?

Not extensively mind you, but I have looked through recent months courts records and cant see any evidence of Betiereflow Ltd. getting a judgement registered against someone.

Our man in Havana

The Indo would disagree with you there.

maggy_thatcher

ImeldaD wrote: »

I can't believe there is a toll anywhere else in the world that doesn't have at least a few booths that you can pay as you cross. This surely has to be against them that they can't accommodate this.

1. The entire Swiss Motorway system - you can only buy an annual pass for this, and you don't do it on entry to the motorway (you can buy them in shops close to the border). If you're caught on the motorway without one you can be significantly fined.
2. In Canada there's the ETR which works in exactly the same way as the M50.
3. In London there's the congestion charge.

Just 3 examples from the top of my head of other places that have a similar "pay us yourself" systems.

Personally I think the barrier-free tolling system is great, and I wish they did the same to all the other tolls in the country.

Our man in Havana

Add to that

1. The entire Austrian motorway system. Buy a pass beforehand.
2. The Hungarian motorways buy a pass beforehand
3. Czech motorways buy a pass beforehand
4. Slovak motorways buy a pass beforehand
5. Slovenian motorways buy a pass beforehand
6. Tullamarine expressway in Melbourne, Australia. Pay in shops afterwards.

Seth Brundle

maggy_thatcher wrote: »

Personally I think the barrier-free tolling system is great, and I wish they did the same to all the other tolls in the country.

In what way is it great?
Because there are no longer queues? But is it great because it cost so much to keep what should be a simple system running?
Or is it because with a username like that you are in favour of private companys running public infrastructure?

R.O.R

Barrier free might not be the best run thing in the world, but for someone who commutes that section of the M50 it's been fu**ing brilliant!

Still costs me the same for the toll as it did when the barriers were there (€2 with a tag) and I'm saving around €10 a week in fuel costs because I'm not queing for 45 mins to get through the bridge.

Beteirfowl or whatever they are called are still a shower of sh1tes in my opinion though.

Seth Brundle

Thanks - I had hoped to emphasise that there is a difference between a barrier free bridge and barrier free tolling.
One is good, the other as you say is shíte!

maggy_thatcher

kbannon wrote: »

In what way is it great?
Because there are no longer queues? But is it great because it cost so much to keep what should be a simple system running?
Or is it because with a username like that you are in favour of private companys running public infrastructure?

I like it because there are no longer queues, saving both time and money (have you considered the amount of fuel used sitting in a traffic jam or even just slowing down just to speed back up again?).

Looking at the costs involved, I wonder how much of it is spent chasing down the guys who aren't paying the bills? Also, the government needed to get its cut back from the big pay-off it had to pay NTR to break out of their contract early.

I'm not universally in favour of private companies running public infrastructure, but I'm not universally against it either. A lot of PPP's have, in my view, significantly helped our infrastructure; they simply wouldn't be built without it, and I definitely believe that they should be looked into more often.

browner85

i botteled and paid them 1500 last week..... shoulda went t court.... also should a paid in time!!!

niceirishfella

Blimey, €1500 notes.......bet you feel bad ehhhhhhhhh.

2nd Row Donkey

.. just a small update.

Got my receipt in the post the other day with no mention of the "other" "pending prosecution" tolls from July.

So I rang them up (the solicitors) and asked what the deal was.. left my contact details and then got a call back two days later to say that they had been in touch with eflow and that the other unpaid tolls had been "filtered out of the system".

She gave me a list of 6 unpaid tolls - 2 from March (when I didn't even own the car) and the other 4 from July which I was originally quering.

Basically she explained that these tolls where never passed from eflow to Pierce & Fitzgibbon in the 1st place even though the eflow website has them maked as "pending prosecution".

They appearr to have been "abandoned" or have slipped through the cracks somewhere but she assures me I won't be getting a nasty letter in the post about them anything in the future.

fingers crossed xx

niceirishfella

2nd Row Donkey wrote: »

she assures me I won't be getting a nasty letter in the post about them anything in the future.

fingers crossed xx

I'd want that in writing,that crowd are a mess.

dhaslam

I just received a demand for a trip that I didn't make. It seems that they have a photograph on the system but they don't bother to check them when they send out reminders. It looks like if you are registered and your number is close you get a bill. They need to be investigated to see whether they are abusing their stored information. There are a few other items that they are still doing improperly. They don't refer to the information on the back of the letter where it says how to deal with problems. They must inform you that there is more relevant information on the back of the page. Also the procedure they suggest to access on line does not work. It only allows you to pay the wrong demand.

It seems that that there is now a new organisation running it and they admit that recognition was very bad in the previous regime. One thing they say they are now doing is printing a reference on payments so that they can be referenced. They still do not have a printable receipt for when you pay online. Saying that you have to write down numbers off the screen when you pay is just ridiculous. I found that they have two trips that I paid last year still listed as outstanding because it seems they cannot find the payments. In Irish law it is a criminal offence not to keep proper records of transactions and not having a reference on payemnts made is just not acceptable, particularly for a large scale computerised enterprise. I reported them to the Gardai but they say it is a civil matter.

Toto Wolfcastle

They do have online printable receipts.

Sizzler

dhaslam wrote: »

I just received a demand for a trip that I didn't make. It seems that they have a photograph on the system but they don't bother to check them when they send out reminders. It looks like if you are registered and your number is close you get a bill. They need to be investigated to see whether they are abusing their stored information. There are a few other items that they are still doing improperly. They don't refer to the information on the back of the letter where it says how to deal with problems. They must inform you that there is more relevant information on the back of the page. Also the procedure they suggest to access on line does not work. It only allows you to pay the wrong demand.

It seems that that there is now a new organisation running it and they admit that recognition was very bad in the previous regime. One thing they say they are now doing is printing a reference on payments so that they can be referenced. They still do not have a printable receipt for when you pay online. Saying that you have to write down numbers off the screen when you pay is just ridiculous. I found that they have two trips that I paid last year still listed as outstanding because it seems they cannot find the payments. In Irish law it is a criminal offence not to keep proper records of transactions and not having a reference on payemnts made is just not acceptable, particularly for a large scale computerised enterprise. I reported them to the Gardai but they say it is a civil matter.

How did you pay as a matter of interest? Online via credit or laser card? If they cant "find" the payment then go back to your bank and tell them the transaction was unauthorised and get a refund from them. They will recharge it back to eflow, that will shut them up.

If you want some satisfaction speak to the NRA, they are responsible for this mess. Names and contacts on are on the NRA website. PM me if you want more specifics.

dhaslam

Thanks. I was told by Margaret in their office this morning that they don't. I didn't make a payment this time so I didn't know. Previously they didn't have that facility. They do seem to have tidied things up a bit and having a payment reference on the credit card statement is the most important. When an organuisation has the facility to fine people 40 euro per transaction and up to 5000 euro in the courts the government has a responsibility to ensure that there are safeguards which clearly they did not put in place, at least in the beginning. There are still issues in relation to proper verification, abuse of stored information and facility to dispute errors.

mcwhirter

I recently moved over from eflow to easytrip and have had no problems since.
Eflow are a joke.

Sizzler

Nice bit of propagnda from eflow and the NRA today issued via the Indo :rolleyes:

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/motorists-fork-out-euro50000-on-m50-toll-fines-every-day-1937659.html

wrote:

THE National Roads Authority (NRA) is making €50,000 a day from motorists who don't pay the M50 toll on time.

Motorists using the capital's ring road are forgetting to pay tolls on time -- turning the new system into a lucrative cash cow for the NRA.

Fines are now bringing in 16pc of the overall revenue generated by the road.

One driver has been forced to pay €1,671 for repeatedly using the M50 without paying the €3 toll.

Last week, a survey found that 40pc of the 100,000 people who use the road every day would rather pay at a toll booth than use the 'post pay' system now in place.

New figures given to the Irish Independent show that more than 5,200 motorists have been issued with a summons to go to court because of unpaid fines and penalties.

And one in 10 drivers fails to pay the toll on time, incurring an immediate €3 fine.

Thousands more allow fines to mount up by not paying further penalties, making the 34km motorway a money spinner for the NRA.

The figures show that the NRA collected €59m in tolls between January and September 1 this year.

Penalties

But another €12m has been collected in penalties and fines -- or 16pc of all revenue.

When the motorway was bought from National Toll Roads (NTR) for €600m last year, toll revenue of €80m per year was forecast.

But this amount will exceed expectations for the first full year of operation due to late payment fines and penalties.

The M50 is one of a handful of barrier-free motorways in the world.

In August 2008, the barriers were removed and a new system was introduced where motorists had the option to open a pre or post-paid account or use a pay-as-you-go system.

People with accounts paid €2 or €2.50 per trip, while pay-as-you-go customers paid €3.

But if the toll wasn't paid by 8pm the following day, a fine of €3 was applied to the toll charge.

If this €6 wasn't paid within 14 days, a charge of €47.50 was added. Failure to pay this total of €47.50 within 56 days resulted in an additional penalty of €104.50 being applied -- a total of €152.

The NRA said that while it did not want to impose penalties, there had to be a sanction for non-compliant drivers.

"It's about the operation and toll collection, it's not about penalties," a spokesman said. "It's an enforcement matter. If there is not a stick, people will not comply and nine out of every 10 do.

"There are notifications on the M50 including Variable Message Signs and radio advertising twice a year on the national radio stations and locally. It is change management -- you're asking people to interact differently with a tolling system and the Irish people have done an outstanding job.

"But you need a penalty system so the people who pay feel the system is fair. There needs to be fairness in this."

Some 25 million trips were made on the motorway in the first nine months of the year, and all the penalty revenue goes back into the maintenance of the road.

The NRA also said:


Some 73pc of all M50 users have a pre-paid account. Of the remainder, one in three -- or almost 10pc of all daily users -- don't pay the toll by 8pm the following day.

Some 5,206 summonses have been issued for non-payment. All were settled except six which went to court. In five of these cases, judgment was in favour of the NRA. In the sixth case, the owner claimed his car was stolen and the court is waiting garda confirmation.

A total of 100,000 motorists use the road every day -- some 4.2pc are out-of-state drivers and most pay; 3pc of the 100,000 are from Northern Ireland and from next year the NRA will begin billing these motorists for unpaid tolls.


The roads authority admitted that up to 200 drivers a day were incorrectly billed, or 0.2pc of total daily users.

"The operator has introduced additional measures which have seen that figure reduce and is considering additional system enhancements to address any misreads, but the 99.8pc is an industry best," the spokesman said.

So from 5,206 summonses only 6 went to court? 0.001%? Find that hard to belive, Id say the other 5,198 settled or they decided it wasnt worth going to court. Also their red flag case was someone who was brought to court for €1,671 for repeatedly using the M5O without paying for it? Looks like only 11 journeys? Hardly a master criminal! Me thinks this number was the settlement figure!

Also note NI reg cars are getting away scott free, also I seriously doubt if eastern european reg cars are paying to the extent they make out.

Seth Brundle

The M50 is one of a handful of barrier-free motorways in the world.

This is news to me!

deaglan169

i went through this evening but my tag didnt beep as usual does this mean it didnt scan my tag and ill now have to pay the usual fee of 3.80 i think it is via the website like and unregistered car would? or will it read my number plate and realise i do have an account?