By Dave Lieber
watchdog@star-telegram.com
Personally, I'm satisfied with my TollTag account with the North Texas Tollway Authority. I love driving the road I call the "Which-President-Bush-Is-It-Tollway?" Fast and smooth. A delight at 75 mph.
I understand that soon, if I don't want to sit in stalled traffic, roads I've driven for free for almost two decades will cost money. I get that a drive from Interstate 35W to North East Mall at rush hour will cost around $2. I get that commuters who want to travel quickly to and from work could spend several hundred dollars a month.
I know but don't like that our state leaders signed a 52-year contract with Cintra, a company in Spain, to build the roads. The company can raise tolls at any time. And unlike with the old Dallas-Fort Worth Turnpike, tolls won't go away once the road is paid for.
Yeah, I get that this change represents the newest utility in my life. Water. Electricity. Gas. Cable. Internet. Now toll roads.
But a lot of folks don't get it. I hear every week from somebody who is shocked to find that $5 or $25 worth of tolls mushroomed with penalties and fees into a bill of hundreds or thousands of dollars. In extreme cases, an arrest warrant is issued.
Unlike with the electricity and gas bills, people who don't pay their toll bills are, in rare cases, arrested and forced to spend a night in jail. Now the tollway authority says it will publish on
ntta.org the names, cities of residence, ZIP codes and debt amount of its top 26,000 scofflaws.
I don't have a problem with that, except to point out that if you don't pay your cable or Internet bill, you don't end up on a most-wanted list.
That's because the other entities don't have the word "authority" in their name.
Authority means you are quasigovernment with the powers of government behind you.
This particular authority bungled the transformation from tollbooths staffed by people to an e-system that photographs a license plate and sends a bill by mail to those without TollTags.
It's easy to understand the confusion. I drove 50 miles on the Which-President-Bush-Is-It-Tollway? last week, and I saw only one or two little signs that promise a bill in the mail.
Without tollbooths and signs, what's an unknowing driver to do? How do motorists know they are supposed to get a bill after five trips and the bill goes to the address listed for the vehicle in the state Department of Motor Vehicles database? What if the address is wrong?
The Watchdog and many readers championed a new law that took effect last year capping the administrative fee at $25 for each unpaid invoice, not to exceed $200. Previously, the authority charged $25 for every unpaid toll transaction. A single invoice could contain dozens of transactions.
What has happened since the law took effect?
Well, the authority has decided to use more of its authority. In addition to its most-wanted list, it no longer works with people who don't pay up after the second notice.Now once a customer reaches the collection agency phase -- more than 90 days after the first invoice is mailed -- the customer has to work with the collection agency.
Spokeswoman Susan Slupecki said, "In the past, and as a gesture of good will, the NTTA would continue to work with customers after their invoices had been forwarded to a collection agency. The hope was that these customers would maintain a TollTag account and keep the balance in good standing.
"What the NTTA has learned, however, is that even the new billing procedures outlined by Senate Bill 469 have not significantly changed the behavior of those customers who simply refuse to pay," she said.
The authority says it does its best to get bills to the right people.
It gets weekly DMV address updates and uses the U.S. Postal Service's "Track and Trace" system, which confirms placement of envelopes with invoices into a mail carrier's bag for delivery.The Texas Department of Public Safety is supposed to issue citations only after a vehicle's title matches the driver's license record and address.
Recently, The Watchdog asked for help for Don Adams, 80, who said he received a delayed bill for $71 for tolls from several years before. "I ignored the bill, thinking it may have been a clerical error. ... When they changed to an electronic billing system, I was confused."
By the time his debt reached a collection agency, loaded with fees and penalties, the amount was $1,196.
The authority says it had a bad address for Adams. When it found a good address, Adams was billed the original amount with no added costs. But he didn't pay because of his confusion.
Slupecki told The Watchdog: "I was able to get it further reduced to $445 and have extended the due date out yet another three months. While I can understand and appreciate his situation, it's probably going to be the best we can do."
Want to avoid this? Get a TollTag at a city hall near you. Check your account regularly, as you would a bank account. Make sure that the address on your driver's license matches the address on your vehicle registration -- and that it's the address where you receive your mail.
The Watchdog column appears Fridays and Sundays.Dave Lieber, 817-390-7043Twitter: @davelieber
Looking for comments?
