Cashless payment systems like E-ZPass have helped make highway driving a less irksome experience by speeding up lines. Rental car companies even offer this option so you don’t have to worry about an embarrassing last-minute scrounge for change at the tollbooth, but rental car customers are now realizing that this convenience can come at a huge price. [More]
tolls
San Francisco Suing Hertz For Allegedly Ripping Off Car Renters On Golden Gate Bridge
By 3.2.17 — Updated: 5.9.17
If you rent a car from Hertz in San Francisco, it’ll automatically pay the toll for crossing the Golden Gate Bridge. But the city says in a new lawsuit that the rental car company is gouging tourists by fraudulently charging them millions of dollars in extra fees. [More]
NJ Man Arrested For 323 Toll Violations Worth $20K Enters Drivers’ Hall Of Toll Shame
By 11.18.16
There’s that one time you didn’t realize your auto-paying toll pass wasn’t in the car, and then there’s earning yourself 323 toll violations and failing to pay the $20,869 in fees and fines you owe. [More]
Couple Accused Of Stuffing Toll Baskets To Steal Coins Join Drivers’ Hall Of Toll Shame
By 11.8.16
While it’s doubtful that anyone has ever driven up to a tollbooth and exclaimed, “Oh, goodie! I get to pay a toll!” it’s important to help keep the nation’s roads maintained and drivable. Police in New Jersey say that one couple not only avoided paying tolls, but hatched a scheme to pocket all those coins for themselves. [More]
Police Arrest NJ Driver Accused Of Skipping Tolls More Than 500 Times
By 7.14.16
There’s the one time you realize too late that you’re in the wrong lane/don’t have your E-ZPass or otherwise fail to pay a toll as you should, and then there’s blowing through tolls 500 times before the police catch up with you. [More]
Pay Tolls Directly When Renting A Car, Or Face Modest Yet Annoying Fees
By 1.6.16
Last year, I rented a car while mine was off having damage fixed. The danger in renting a car and then going about your normal routine is that you may forget that the rental car doesn’t have a toll transponder, and breeze through the EZPass lane as you normally would. I knew what was coming: a $25 bill for my 60¢ toll. Reader Allen didn’t know, and had to pay $35 for a $1 toll. Let these experiences serve as cautionary tales. [More]
Woman Who Hasn’t Visited Bay Area In 15 Years Forced To Fight 55 Toll Tickets For Bridges She Didn’t Drive Over
By 11.20.15
It’s annoying when you receive a ticket for something you never did, but you know what’s even more annoying? Getting 55 tickets in a year for that thing you never did. A California woman who says she hasn’t driven the five hours to the Bay Area in more than 15 years had quite the headache trying to deal with an avalanche of tickets she received from the local authority for not paying bridge tolls on bridges she never drove over. [More]
Police: Man Pretended He Was His Brother To Avoid $7,500 In Unpaid Tolls
By 7.31.15
It’s a classic caper: passing yourself off as your brother or sister to squirm out of trouble when you’re caught doing something you shouldn’t. But New Jersey police say one man didn’t quite pull off the sibling switcheroo when he was stopped for $7,500 in unpaid tolls. [More]
Florida’s New Toll Road Express Lanes Mean Drivers Who Use Them Will Be Paying Twice
By 7.16.15
How do you feel about paying tolls? They’re probably not your favorite thing, but if you want to drive on certain roads, they’re a necessity. Drivers in Florida who want to use new express lanes on some of the state’s roads will now be facing a unique situation — double-tolling, the first instance of such a thing in the U.S. [More]
Police Say Trucker Used Bond, James Bond-Style Device To Avoid Paying $95 Toll
By 2.27.15
Perhaps you think you’re clever, sure, but just because you can pull a James Bond and movie move and rig your car in a way that helps you break the law, doesn’t mean you won’t get in trouble for it. Police in New York say a truck driver tried to skirt the rules by modifying his bumper in such a way that it could flip up and hide his license plate when he went through tolls. [More]
Dealership Registers Car To Wrong Person, Random Lady Gets 18 Tickets In the Mail
By 10.14.14
An 87-year-old woman in California was confused when she started to receive parking tickets and toll notices in the mail. She had 18 separate tickets, with a total of almost $1500 in fines. Was she racking up tickets and forgetting to pay? No, and she could prove it: she no longer drives at all. The tickets listed her as the owner of a white Acura, and she doesn’t own one. [More]
Enterprise Made An Extra $18 Because They Didn’t Tell Me I Might Need An EZ-Pass
By 5.2.13 — Updated: 9.8.16
We now live in a brave new world of unmanned tollbooths. B, for one, is not a fan. He rented a car recently, and Enterprise didn’t make EZ-Pass transponders available to customers. He crossed a bridge that had two options for paying its toll: automatically charged to your license plate through the mail, or EZ-Pass. Since it was a rental, he got slapped with a $18 convenience fee for the toll on just one bridge. [More]
Would You Risk A $200 Ticket To Save $2 In Bridge Tolls?
By 3.14.13
When authorities in the San Francisco area enacted congestion-based pricing on the Bay Bridge, charging higher rates before 10 a.m., they didn’t imagine that so many people would risk up to $200 in fines just to save two dollars at the toll plaza. [More]
Washington State Fines Woman For Not Paying Toll Bridge Bill She Never Received
By 10.18.12
The way bills work, it’s a lot easier to pay one when you actually receive it to begin with. Otherwise we’d all be sitting around trying to psychically suss out where we should be sending off money and in what amount. One woman in Seattle was mystified to receive a fine for not paying a toll bridge bill she never got in the mail. The fine notification made its way to her just fine, of course. [More]
The Case Of The Phantom I-Pass Transponder
By 10.24.07
Reader and commenter ChicagoOutfit is having trouble with Illinois’ much-loved tollway system. His I-Pass account has someone else’s transponder attached to it and he’s paying for some random jerk’s tolls. He calls the ISTHA and has it removed, but Illinois doesn’t refund his money and the transponder keeps coming back.
New Hampshire Jails 68-Year-Old Man For Paying Toll With Tokens
By 9.16.07
Meet Thomas Jensen. The state that boasts “Live Free Or Die” jailed him for three days for trying to pay a fifty-cent toll with two tokens. Jensen believes the tokens represent a contract with New Hampshire that was illegally violated last January when the state began exclusively using E-Z Pass. A toll worker refused to accept the tokens and directed Jensen to a state tropper, who issued a citation for theft of services. A judge gave Jensen three choices: pay a $150 fine, perform community service, or spend three days in jail. Jensen chose jail.
Jensen never told his wife he was in jail. Beverly Jensen said she only found out when asked by a television news reporter.
SunPass Regularly Overcharges Customers
By 7.28.07
SunPass, Florida’s automated prepaid toll system responsible for processing 2 million tolls each day, regularly overcharges and erroneously bills customers, according to an investigation from WTSP.
E-ZPass Charge You Fee When It Malfunctions
By 7.27.07
The Red Tape Chronicles has an interesting story from Kathy Sunato, a Pennsylvania driver who noticed that E-ZPass was charging her strange $5 fees.
