{"id":51345,"date":"2014-01-07T09:46:25","date_gmt":"2014-01-07T07:46:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/?p=51345"},"modified":"2014-01-07T11:05:02","modified_gmt":"2014-01-07T09:05:02","slug":"new-e-tag-sales-stats-from-sanral","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/government\/51345\/new-e-tag-sales-stats-from-sanral\/","title":{"rendered":"New e-tag sales stats from Sanral"},"content":{"rendered":"

The South African National Roads Agency Limited (Sanral<\/a>) says it has sold 960,000 e-tags for its controversial\u00a0e-tolling system in Gauteng, one month after its launch.<\/p>\n

The figures quoted by Sanral in the past have been disputed by\u00a0the Opposition to Urban Tolling Alliance (Outa<\/a>).<\/p>\n

In mid December, Outa’s\u00a0chairman Wayne Duvenage<\/a> accused Sanral of\u00a0inflating its e-tag sales to more than double their actual number.<\/p>\n

“Based on a statistically sound sample size, Outa’s research shows that only 15 percent of freeway users are tagged and nine percent of vehicles counted off the freeway were tagged,” Duvenage said in a statement.<\/p>\n

“Obviously, it is the freeway-user count that matters in this exercise, but the off-freeway count helps to corroborate our findings.”<\/p>\n

At the time, Sanral spokesman Vusi Mona<\/a> said that 890,388 VLN\/e-tags had been sold.<\/p>\n

Outa’s research showed, of a sample of 2,098 cars which used the freeway, only 317 had e-tags which equated to about 15.1%.<\/p>\n

Of a sample of 2,236 cars which did not use the freeways, 212 had e-tags, which meant a figure of around 9.5%.<\/p>\n

Applying the sample to the total number of cars which used Gauteng’s freeways every month, being around 2.3 million cars, Outa estimated that the number of e-tags sold was closer to 350,000.<\/p>\n

“Even if one pushed the e-tag penetration rate to 20%, the number of e-tags in use will be no more than 450,000,” Duvenage said.<\/p>\n

“Which is around half the number of tags sales recently espoused by Sanral.”<\/p>\n

E-tolling has already come under fire with\u00a0people\u00a0complaining\u00a0about incorrect e-toll bills being sent to them via e-mail and SMS.<\/p>\n

Many users reported that they received very high bills when they only used the toll roads once or twice. Others reported that they received e-toll bills without ever using Gauteng\u2019s roads.<\/p>\n

Last week Beeld reported that a man who has been dead since October 2012 received an SMS warning that he had overdue e-toll fees of R612.21.<\/p>\n

Sanral spokesperson Vusi Mona told Jacaranda FM that Sanral, being a state entity, is entitled to obtain information including a mobile phone number to contact the public regarding collection.<\/p>\n

He urged people to register for the system so as to be up to date on the correct amount owed, rather than wait for an invoice from Sanral.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe obligation to pay arises as soon as you go under the gantries. There are notices on the highway telling you exactly how much you\u2019re supposed to be paying,\u201d Mona told Eye Witness News.<\/p>\n

The e-tolling system was launched in Guateng on 3 December 2013, with a second phase covering\u00a0at least 300km of the province\u2019s highways in the pipeline.<\/p>\n

More on e-tolls and e-tags<\/h3>\n

E-tags: millions unsold<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

E-toll prosecutions months away<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

E-tolls are cheap for users: Sanral<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

E-tolls: pay up or else<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

E-tolls: threats, intimidation and a climate of fear<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sanral says it has sold 960,000 e-tags for its controversial e-tolling system in Gauteng, one month after its launch.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":50901,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23],"tags":[1650,26,1988,429],"class_list":["post-51345","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-government","tag-e-tolling","tag-headline","tag-outa","tag-sanral"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51345","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51345"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51345\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":51366,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51345\/revisions\/51366"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/50901"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51345"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51345"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51345"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}