New systems to facilitate the payment of electronic tolls by drivers of foreign plated vehicles have been developed and are expected to be implement as from July, announced the national roads authority Estradas de Portugal (EP).
In a statement sent to the press, EP said that it had signed collaboration agreements with the CTT and UNICRE, the entity in charge of issuing and managing payment cards, for the development and implementation of the new systems.
With UNICRE, the EP is creating a payment facility to allow drivers of foreign plated cars to pay for the tolls by using a bank card.
The system associates the number plate to the bank card, with toll charges debited from the account associated to the card, explained EP. Drivers are then issued proof of payment.
António Ramalho from UNICRE said: “We expect the payment procedure to last no longer than 10 seconds and hope it will generate total revenue of more than €10 million a year.”
He said new toll payment equipment was expected to be installed by mid July.
Another system, developed by EP in association with the CTT, is the ‘Toll Card.” It is being set up exclusively for drivers of foreign-plated vehicles, allowing them to purchase a pre-charged card, which the driver will activate by sending an SMS and associating the card to the vehicle’s number plate.
The Toll Card will be available for purchase online or at CTT offices, motorway service stations and other outlets to be announced, “and perhaps even abroad”.
“This solution, to be implemented by the end of June this year will complement other solutions being developed to facilitate and speed up the process of paying for the electronic tolls,” said EP.
