Almost 300,000 motorists have taken the\u00a060% discount on their outstanding e-toll bills, said the Electronic Toll Collection (ETC) company.<\/p>\n
ETC said there has been a last-minute rush from e-toll users to take up the offer of a discount on tolls incurred from 3 December 2013 to 31 August 2015.<\/p>\n
Motorists have until 2 May 2016 to qualify for the discount.<\/p>\n
In addition to implementing the government\u2019s plan to encourage e-toll payment, Sanral has also stepped up its collection efforts.<\/p>\n
Outa recently issued a statement confirming that several of its members had received High Court summonses for\u00a0outstanding e-toll bills\u00a0ranging between R400,000 and R8 million<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n \u201cOuta\u2019s lawyers have filed notices of intention to defend these matters with the North Gauteng High Court and a trial of this nature could possibly take years to finalise,\u201d said Outa.<\/p>\n It said Sanral decided to issue summonses against less than 0.3% of e-toll defaulters, despite the fact that over 2 million motorists refuse to pay for the scheme.<\/p>\n Outa said this is nothing short of state coercion and victimisation.<\/p>\n The ETC said its call centre for the 60% discount offer has seen an increase of 110% in incoming calls compared to the average daily calls taken in March.<\/p>\n It usually receives 1,300 telephone calls and makes 2,250 outbound calls per day.<\/p>\n On 26 April it received 2,500 calls thanks to the last-minute rush, it said.<\/p>\n While the ETC would not disclose how much the 300,000 motorists have paid, it said that payments for the first 27 days of April exceeded those for March by 39%.<\/p>\n \u201cThe collection activity is based on varying degrees of certainty and settlement figures change daily.\u201d<\/p>\n R8 million e-toll bill battle heads to court<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n Sanral vs Outa over e-toll report error<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\nETC\u2019s phones ringing off the hook<\/h3>\n
More on e-tolls<\/h3>\n