THE Department of Transportation (DOTr), Land Transportation Office (LTO) and the Toll Regulatory Board (TRB) have approved the joint circular that will penalize motorists passing through the expressway without a valid electronic toll collection (ETC) device and those with insufficient balance, effective by the end of this month.
This is part of the government’s initiatives to shift to a cashless toll collection system this year.
Joint Memorandum Circular (JMC) No. 2024-001, the “Revised guidelines for all vehicles traveling on toll expressway,” was signed by the DOTr, TRB, and LTO on August 1.
It was published on August 16 and is set to take effect on August 31.
The JMC will enforce the prohibitions/restrictions against motorists entering dedicated ETC lanes with no valid ETC device and with no sufficient load.
Under the joint circular, the penalty for entering a limited access highway without the required valid ETC device is P1,000 and P2,000 for the first and second offense, respectively. Subsequent offenses will have a penalty of P5,000 per offense.
For those with insufficient account balance, the penalty for the first offense is P500; second offense, P 1,000; and subsequent offenses, P2,500 per offense.
For public, road safety and security purposes, the use of fraudulent, tampered or fake ETC device and E-Card upon entry and exit on toll expressway shall also be penalized for the first offense of P1,000, P2,000 for second offense and P5,000 for subsequent offenses.
A motorist who commits the violation three times within 12 months may have his driver’s license confiscated his car registration suspended.
The TRB said erring motorists represent 9 percent of all the motorists using the toll expressways, causing unnecessary delays and long queues at the toll plazas.
A vast majority of toll expressway users, 91 percent, are compliant and responsible ETC users and are often greatly inconvenienced by the erring motorists, it added.
With the said restrictions and the corresponding fines, the implementation of the joint circular intends to achieve a smoother and faster flow of traffic at the toll plazas, thereby saving time, money and resources, the TRB said.
The TRB also said it shall issue subsequent advisories on the joint circular to discuss the details of the other provisions, such as the responsibilities of the toll expressway concessionaires, RFID service providers, toll expressway users, LTO and TRB, as well as its salient provisions.
The toll expressway concessionaires and the LTO shall also conduct an information campaign on the joint circular.
