DIVERSIFIED conglomerate San Miguel Corp. (SMC) said on Tuesday cashless transactions on its toll roads now account for 85 percent of its total toll transactions.
This penetration rate, according to SMC President Ramon S. Ang, is a welcome development, as motorists now favor RFID payments over cash, despite the availability of a few cash-based toll booths.
“Since December, and even through January and February, there has been a big improvement in traffic throughput at almost all our toll plazas, as majority of motorists have followed government’s safety protocol of using electronic toll collection. We’re no longer seeing the kind of lines we used to have when majority of motorists were using cash payments,” he said.
SMC operates the Southern Tagalog Arterial Road (Star), South Luzon Expressway (Slex), the Skyway System, Naia Expressway, and the Tarlac-Pangasinan-La Union Expressway (Tplex).
“So apart from minimizing the risk of spreading Covid-19, especially now that there are new variants, the cashless system is also providing more convenience and ease of travel for motorists, especially now that more people are coming back to work and the economy is reopening gradually. This is definitely a big benefit to motorists,” Ang said.
While the government mandated the full shift to cashless toll transactions, it also gave more breathing room for motorists who have yet to avail of RFID stickers.
However, Ang said that at major toll plazas such as the Calamba toll gate, where there are still a large volume of motorists using cash, traffic congestion continues to be a regular occurrence in the area, as the buildup of cash motorists tend to block RFID users.
There are also incidences of RFID tags with insufficient balances, which causes traffic build ups at toll plazas.
The Toll Regulatory Board (TRB) plans to implement a three-strike rule for erring motorists that cause congestion due to insufficient balances.
Under the proposed three-strike policy, erring motorists will receive a reminder to load for the first offense, a warning for the second offense, and apprehension and pre-Covid penalties for those who commit the offense for the third time.
Ang said that the company will comply with TRB’s new policy as its system is able to monitor repeat offenders.
“We will continue to work to make necessary adjustments and improvements to support government initiatives and ensure that motorists will have better, safer journeys on our expressways,” Ang said. Ang said the company will comply with TRB’s new policy as its system is able to monitor repeat offenders. He also assured existing RFID users even more convenience in reloading and monitoring their Autosweep accounts.
Motorists can either top up or reload at any of the Autosweep Point-of-Sales, SMC Toll Gates, and accredited Merchant Reloading partners across the whole Luzon area.
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