Gauteng motorists have run up more than half a billion rand in overdue fees since the province’s e-tolling system started on December 3 last year, according to Transport Minister Dipuo Peters.<\/p>\n
Less than 10% of this has been paid.<\/p>\n
“I am informed that… as at March 1 [this year] an amount of R543,544,574 worth of invoices were transferred to the VPC [Violations Processing Centre],” she said in written reply to a parliamentary question.<\/p>\n
The VPC is the debt-collection division within the SA National Roads Agency Limited (Sanral) responsible for the collection and processing of overdue e-toll transactions.<\/p>\n
Contacted for comment on Wednesday, Sanral spokesman Vusi Mona said the R543.5 million included both those motorists with e-tags who had overdue accounts, as well as those who had not registered but were picked up by the tolling system.<\/p>\n
“It is those people who have amounts outstanding, whether registered or not,” he said.<\/p>\n
Mona could not immediately say what percentage of Gauteng motorists had registered to date.<\/p>\n
In her response to the parliamentary question — posed by Democratic Alliance MP Ian Ollis — Peters also revealed that “an amount of R54,735,638 (excluding VAT) has been expended in the collection of the debt”.<\/p>\n
This figure included R32.8 million “for postage and printing of invoices” and a further R21.9 million for “the cost of debt collection processes”.<\/p>\n
However, responding to a second parliamentary question, Peters said of the total of R543.5 million transferred to the VPC, only R50,043,487, or 9.21%, had been paid as at February 28.<\/p>\n