HYDERABAD: Commuters on the Outer Ring Road say they are hassled by the absence of ‘free passage’ through toll plazas. Reason: the electronic toll collection FASTags —which provide special stickers to the vehicles and separate queues for them at toll booths —have been absent since a long time now.
The Hyderabad Growth Corridor Limited (HGCL) has proposed to implement the FASTag system on ORR soon. FastTag is an innovative Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) based Toll Management System (TMS), which is used to collect toll from the users on Main Carriage Way (MCW) that allows vehicles to pass without stopping for cash transactions. The user has to paste the sticker on the top middle portion of the windshield behind the rearview mirror. It is operated by Indian Highways Management Company Limited (IHMCL) across the country.
As it’s being used across India, the State government too approved the system last year to be implemented on ORR. Now, the HGCL is considering to have at least one RFID lane at each entry and exit plaza. It has proposed 69 hybrid lanes with RFID ETC System. Meanwhile, HGCL is holding discussions with IHMCL and SBI (as acquirer bank) on accepting FASTag digital payment. A memorandum of understanding would be signed shortly. A four per cent transacation fee would be paid by HGCL to IHMCL. As many as 13.66 lakh FASTag have been issued and accepted in 403 toll plazas with 18 per cent penetration.
The toll plaza operator will deploy a toll plaza server to process the ETC lane transactions. The server will receive information from various systems installed on the ETC lane. Using this information an ETC transaction is initiated, the toll plaza server will process the transaction and send it in a specified (IHMCL) format to the acquiring host system for toll fare calculation and processing transaction.The services of the banks certified by NPCI are required for issuance of FASTags (Issuer bank) and for subsequent confirmation of the transaction on the said FASTags (Acquirer bank).