The National Highways Authority of India on Wednesday said it has decided to do away with the requirement of maintaining a minimum amount in FASTag wallet.
The move aims at ensuring seamless movement at electronic toll plazas.
"In order to increase the FASTag penetration to ensure seamless movement of traffic and to reduce avoidable delays at the toll plazas, NHAI has decided to remove the mandatory threshold amount for the FASTag account / wallet, which was paid by the user in addition to the security deposit for the passenger segment (Car/Jeep/Van)," NHAI said in a statement.
It said issuer banks were unilaterally mandating some threshold amount value for the FASTag account/wallet, in addition to the security deposit amount.
As a result, many FASTag users were not allowed to pass through a toll plaza, in spite of having sufficient balance in their FASTag account/wallet, the statement said adding this was resulting into unwanted hassles and avoidable delay at toll plazas.
It has been decided that the users will now be allowed to pass through the toll plaza, if the FASTag account/ wallet balance is non-negative, the statement said.
After crossing the toll plaza, if the account balance becomes negative, the bank can recover the amount from the security deposit, which should be replenished at the time of the next recharge by the user, it added.
With more than 2.54 crore users, FASTag contributes 80 per cent of the total toll collection. Daily toll collection through FASTag has crossed Rs 89 crore mark.
As payment on toll plazas through FASTag will become mandatory from February 15, 2021, National Highways Authority of India is targeting to achieve 100 per cent cashless tolling at the toll plazas across the country.
(Only the headline and picture of this report may have been reworked by the Business Standard staff; the rest of the content is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Dear Reader,
Business Standard has always strived hard to provide up-to-date information and commentary on developments that are of interest to you and have wider political and economic implications for the country and the world. Your encouragement and constant feedback on how to improve our offering have only made our resolve and commitment to these ideals stronger. Even during these difficult times arising out of Covid-19, we continue to remain committed to keeping you informed and updated with credible news, authoritative views and incisive commentary on topical issues of relevance.
We, however, have a request.
As we battle the economic impact of the pandemic, we need your support even more, so that we can continue to offer you more quality content. Our subscription model has seen an encouraging response from many of you, who have subscribed to our online content. More subscription to our online content can only help us achieve the goals of offering you even better and more relevant content. We believe in free, fair and credible journalism. Your support through more subscriptions can help us practise the journalism to which we are committed.
Support quality journalism and subscribe to Business Standard.
Digital Editor
RECOMMENDED FOR YOU