[Vysakh]

Two experiences.
Used it at the Airport toll 2 weeks back. The ETC lane was closed and the guy was sleeping so moved to the adjacent lane and the toll guy asked to carry on. No money deducted yet.

Hosakote toll. Did not detect mine, but the bully fortuner kept honking. The boom barrier opened and I started moving. The board displayed the registration number of the car behind. No money deducted.
During the return leg, it detected and deducted.

[sriturl]

Originally Posted by ajayclicks

Will be driving to Kodai, from Bangalore on 14th April- did not realize it's an extended weekend.

I have ICICI fastag with Rs.240 in balance. Would this be sufficient for the tolls, or should I top up. Any suggestions? Also any tips for specific toll plazas where the lane may not be marked properly or any other issue faced?

Regards,
Ajay

You need 300-400 one way depending on decision to use elevated road in blr or not, and where to deviate from highway to Kodai.
Check this site, they give you an amount of toll and helps with route - http://nhtis.org/nhai/map.htm
Click on toll plaza between two stations link and enter source, destination.

[ajayclicks]

Originally Posted by sriturl

You need 300-400 one way depending on decision to use elevated road in blr or not, and where to deviate from highway to Kodai.
Check this site, they give you an amount of toll and helps with route - http://nhtis.org/nhai/map.htm
Click on toll plaza between two stations link and enter source, destination.

Thanks, this link is quite useful. I wish it would also show fastag enabled tool booths. I will not be using the elevated road @ elec city, as I will be taking the NICE road from Kanakpura to reach Hosur.

[john.gt]

Originally Posted by john.gt

I faced this issue in Jan at Paliyekkara Toll plaza. Raising complaints, calling them, nothing has worked till date. All the customer care executive would say as well as update in the complaint is "we have escalated it but have not got any response yet".
One customer care chap was super confident that the issue would be resolved and money refunded the same day
Its been almost 4 months with no resolution.

Update : The grievance registered at pgportal.gov.in bore fruit at last.
On April 3rd the project director for NHAI Palakkad sent me a mail informing that the issue would be resolved soon and directed Paliyekkara Toll Plaza to take the necessary action.
Immediately another mail from the toll plaza came requesting for the details of the transaction the Fastag account details. Today the amount was refunded into the tag account.
Meanwhile ICICI customer service again updated the complaint mentioning it has been highly escalated

[harmon_bro]

Here is a video that I came across of a person using it and his experience with FAST TAG.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oElRYqpteyM

[SanScorpio]

Originally Posted by SanScorpio

Update: Finally cancelled the Axis bank Fastag, Unbelievably inept service. Now have to get the ICICI one, hopefully they are better than Axis.

Update on the Axis Bank Fastag, They have not yet refunded the money, thinking of getting a legal opinion against these people. Would advice people to stay away from Axis Bank!

[hserus]

Originally Posted by SanScorpio

Update on the Axis Bank Fastag, They have not yet refunded the money, thinking of getting a legal opinion against these people. Would advice people to stay away from Axis Bank!

You mean the agent has not refunded you the money. My guess is that he hasn't paid it in to Axis yet.

The tag would immediately get activated if you paid even Rs.100 into it at the first toll booth fastag POS you find. After that neft / imps transfers to it should work just fine.

I currently have a Rs.1200 balance on my tag in this manner, for an upcoming road trip.

[SanScorpio]

Originally Posted by hserus

You mean the agent has not refunded you the money. My guess is that he hasn't paid it in to Axis yet.

The tag would immediately get activated if you paid even Rs.100 into it at the first toll booth fastag POS you find. After that neft / imps transfers to it should work just fine.

I currently have a Rs.1200 balance on my tag in this manner, for an upcoming road trip.

Nope, not the agent but the incompetent Axis Bank, the wallet was active and showing the balance but the tag never worked. Had asked for a complete refund in the 2nd week of March, the Axis bank call center have highly escalated the matter to the backend and they are not able to refund due to "Due to some system constraint we are unable to close the wallet , the same is raised to our IT team, shall revert asap."

[srvm]

Originally Posted by audioholic

My Celerio finally got Fastagged today after a long drive. Left office to my native today and planned to get Fastag at devanhalli. ......
Reached the Devanahalli toll booth and thanks to Parag Sachania for providing me the contact details of the guy there. He did all the paperwork, activated my account and he stuck the tag himself.

Thank you @audioholic - your above post motivated me finally to get off the fence and jump into the Fastag bandwagon
Called Srinath (Devanahalli toll guy) today. He was very helpful even though he was on leave today. Guided me to another fellow named Manikanta at Devanahalli toll plaza. Submitted the required documents to Manikanta and paid the fees. I have received the tag but Srinath insisted that I paste it on my car on Monday after he activates the tag.
Fingers crossed now. Hope all goes well. The Axis bank fastag stories have made me a wee bit skeptical.
A big shout out to @paragsachania for sharing contact details of Srinath and other details about the procedure

[hserus]

Originally Posted by hserus

I currently have a Rs.1200 balance on my tag in this manner, for an upcoming road trip.

Ok - so a 300 or so km trip from chennai to trichy had two tolls that just didn't take fastag, one toll that had detection enabled plus boom barriers that worked perfectly.

Other tolls had blocked the lane off with a traffic cone till someone could come and use a manual reader. Then there was this amazing toll where the boom was there but they still had to use a manual reader as the sensor was out of order. That took some time to get through :(

[itwasntme]

Has anyone driven through at say 30 km/hr through FASTag and has it worked?

I recently returned from a EU trip and found a lot of access controlled tollways with automated toll booths which needed no real slowing down. Cabbies would routinely drive through at 30 km/hr +.

Why does FASTag need extra slowing down? See my KIAL BLR airport video:

http://youtu.be/o_WWUSunRB8

[hserus]

Originally Posted by itwasntme

Why does FASTag need extra slowing down? See my KIAL BLR airport video:

The sensors are not that sensitive

And besides toll lanes have these massive speedbreaker humps to slow traffic down before the booths. Go through them at a consistent 30 and you'd likely hit your undercarriage on a low ground clearance sedan.

[cool_dube]

Originally Posted by SanScorpio

Better do a test run close by, had the misfortune of going to Pune and back assuming that the fasttag will fasten my track, but no luck, all toll plazas didnot recognise it and i had to pay cash. even tried it yesterday with the same result at the Hoskote toll plaza.

Finally managed to do a trial run today @ Devanahalli toll plaza, ended up with a mixed bag of experiences.

FASTag lane was the right-most one and to begin with, was not manned by anyone. This resulted in cars without tags also getting in. The guy at the booth was nonchalantly accepting cash as if it was a regular booth I had almost reached a conclusion that the reader was not working and had cash ready. When I reached the booth and told the guy that I have a tag, he gave me a "Oh hauda" (oh is it?) and came out with a hand-held reader gun. The tag was detected in a flash and I was waved through. Got an SMS as well, within a few minutes. So, net-net, the tag works Now waiting to try it out at another plaza.

[pcpranav]

Hi.
few days back, I had send them SMS to apply for FasTag, and I got call & email explaining about the formalities. I couriered my papers, cheque for Rs.501, and those reps were regularly calling to update me of progress, though there seems some communication gap from their side. Eventually, I was told that tag is ready and will be couriered soon.
Today saw tag envelope delivered at home. Called the support nu and they were happy to assist me in creating my login (note - the customer id will be provided by support agents based on your registered mobile nu). After login to portal, I saw its quite feature rich, and each & every transaction are recorded, including my most recent call to support nu.
Next, I quickly recharged for Rs.3000, and even waited for few hours, but the online balance didnt increase. Again I called the support nu, and rep was very helpful, and made me understand that I did recharge to my "CUG Account" (its like a temporary wallet), and I will now need to 'transfer' that amount to "Tag" itself, which I did and found the balance populated on my Tag. Recharge can also done directly to "Tag", by selecting that option under Recharge.

For my upcoming long trip, I hope that Fastag will save me some time.

regards,

[audioholic]

Originally Posted by itwasntme

I recently returned from a EU trip and found a lot of access controlled tollways with automated toll booths which needed no real slowing down. Cabbies would routinely drive through at 30 km/hr +.

Access controlled highways? Were you in Spain? In Spain they use active tags which have an inbuilt power source in them. When they sense a tool barrier, it can transmit a higher power signal compared to the passive tags used here. These active tags can enable faster movement through the barriers. However if the battery is weak, its an annoyance and we have to do some circus to reverse it, take out the tag from the vehicle and wave it by hand and so

For passive tags I think it should work well in booths which have multiple antennae. I haven't been successful over the last four times I have used Fastag to pass without stopping. I need to stop for a few seconds only after which the gate opens. Here is how it went at Hoskote toll booth towards Bengaluru:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V1SmqFpGgtg

My parents are quite happy with this, since they do quite some highway travel and no longer have to crib about tolls and queues. The advantage in Hoskote is they have a long dedicated ETC lane and hence, most of the times the crowd starts only after the gate to the Fastag lane. Hence we wont have issues of idiots trying to jump into the ETC