[RRM]

Hello Everyone,

I had a very strange experience with FASTag though never had any inconveniences of using it but had the inconvenience of NOT using it! Weird, but is true!

Well, here is the short story of how money got deducted while the car was in basement and what I had to do to get it back

Wednesday, 07-Sept-2022
It was a normal Wednesday morning. Woke up by around 6.30am, completed the daily chores, tiffins ready etc and the kids on the way to school/college, wife went to school (she is a sr. teacher) and the entire house was mine Yo!. I started to go through personal emails and the first one to open was a mail from ICICI Bank - eToll Alert". I thought some marketing stuff and opened it. There is the surprise in the form of below message

Your ICICI Bank FASTag linked to vehicle no. KA51XX1325 has been debited with 50.00 on date 05-09-2022 10:37:07 for Toll Charges at Nelamangala Toll Plaza toll plaza on 05-09-2022 at 10:09:32. Your available Balance is -11.52

I literally jumped out of my chair and first thing I did was to run to basement of my apartment and check if my car is there or not. Thankfully it was there! Then started to do a flashback whether I had driven to kerala by any chance (will not touch the mentioned plaza unless I take mysore route. I usually take Salem route) or given to anyone my car 2 days back? etc. Also scanned through the SMS lists to check as when you pass through a toll both SMS as well as email is sent, always. No SMS found

I was still trying to figure out what has happened here as during the mentioned date and time my car was sleeping happily in the basement with no disturbance whatsoever. It's time to action to find out how my car crossed the toll plaza which is around 30 kms from my home - all by itself?

Reached out to ICICI toll free number. I was not surprised by the answer that I got from the call centre team -
-ICICI: Sir, this may be a technical glitch
-Me: How come it is as the money has to be deducted only when the car passes through the toll?
-ICICI: Sir, this happens sometimes. As a next step we will raise a complaint with NHAI, and it will be resolved in 25 working days (you read that correctly!)

Knowing that there is no point is fighting as they can't do much here, I thanked and hung up the call. Later received a SMS with complaint# - - Dear Customer, the complaint for your ICICI Bank FASTag has been registered with Ref. No. CMP00000000XXXX073 and will be closed within 25 working days. Yes, the ETA is upto 25 wd

I had no other choice than to play the waiting game. Later I got an unexpected message from ICICI that my ticket has been rejected for the refund, after an investigation and has been closed.

I really got irritated. I know that my car was in the basement, even if they see a CCTV footage, they will not find traces of my car crossing the plaza at the mentioned day and time, how was it rejected even without calling or any discussions?

I called ICICI asking the same query and I was told to call 1033 - NHAI Helpline. Called the helpline and narrated the event. Without asking anything more my complaint was registered pending action and hence the update. I got a WhatsApp message as well from 1033 Helpline.

As usual there was no updates and hence had to call twice since the last complaint raised. On the third call, I was told to upload the docs mentioned below via WhatsApp.

I uploaded the required photos in WhatsApp exactly based on the instructions on 3/Oct/22
——-
For this complaint *FASTag Deduction Without Consent/Travel* we will require you to submit below listed documents

1. Transaction SMS Snapshot
2. Vehicle Front Side Photo
3. Vehicle Side Photo Covering all Axles
4. Vehicle RC Front Side Photo
5. Vehicle RC Back Side Photo

Kindly submit the document one by one.
First please share *Transaction SMS Snapshot*.
——-

I didn't have the SMS, hence uploaded the email screen shot, and other photos as asked. Finally on 17/Oct/22, I got the following message - Dear Customer, we have resolved your ICICI Bank FASTag complaint number CMP00000000XXXX073 and the amount shall be credited in 3 working days to your FASTag Account. I checked the account today and it was credited as committed

Phew, for INR 50, it took me almost 1.5 months to get the refund, for no involvement. The irony was that we have to share everything as if the mistake was done by us

This could have been a classic case of ignoring the email but somehow when I saw the mail sender name, I just opened it to find the least expected.

Has anyone faced similar issue?

Lesson learnt that such mails whether useful or not, open once to ascertain it

All is well that ends well!

Btw - my first post in the forum! Thanks for reading

Mods: - I didnt find a issue thread of fastag and hence started a new one. If it is not the case, please do merge it.

[Mr.U]

Wow that’s quite an ordeal. I’m glad that it was resolved.
The issue my family and I have faced are the opposite to this ie the toll system didn’t want to deduct any money and would say insufficient balance, even though we had enough money in the wallet. This was only with the paytm tags.
With the HDFC tags I have had a few instances where the balance was never deducted for crossing a toll plaza. This has also happened at the Delhi airport where you can pay via the tag for parking, even after being parked for close to 3hrs no parking charge was ever deducted.
Looks like the system still has a few bugs.

[rajeevsulu]

I have not faced the issue that you have. On one instance, recently, I drove to Coimbatore and back from Erode and toll was not deducted atcall both ways. My car is XUV 700 and have an ICICI fastag. Usually they are very accurate! Guess it is a oneoff.

[anjan_c2007]

Very good of you to post this alert thread about the devils lurking in these fasTags, post their linking with bank accounts.

As Winston Churchill had way back in 1937 said:-

"Dictators ride to and fro on tigers from which they dare not dismount. And the tigers are getting hungry."

It can be modified for 2022 as below :-

"Our cars drive to and fro on fasTags that they dare not and cannot de-link with bank account/s. " And the fasTags are getting hungry."

It's always preferable to have some bank account with just a few thousand rupees linked to the fasTags

[lokesharo]

This happened with me last year. I was at home and received SMS twice (up and down) for some toll plaza in Himachal Pradesh.
Called up Airtel couple of times and the money was refunded back without any major follow up.
How can this even happen? Is the technology being misused or there are flaws in the implementation?

[RRM]

@anjan_c2007, agree but in such unexpected scenario, having linked it to a bank account would have been a disaster. Without any involvement 50/- was deducted, not sure how much it would have been whisked away if linked to an account��

Keeping a separate account linking to FASTag makes the best sense but even that account, it will need an AMB of 5k which again is a risk.

Hopefully the idea of deducting based on kms run is spot on or else should defer until the govt is absolutely sure of its implementation accuracy!

[Mustang_Boss]

I usually Travel between Hyderabad and Bangalore.

Once, the First toll from Bangalore was not working. Its around 50 kms from Kempegowda international airport.

At this toll plaza, the systems were not working. I had to switch lanes along with few other cars. After complaining, the head of the plaza started taking photos and then let us go.

After travelling for ~30 kms, i got a message stating "125" Rs has been deducted for toll. Which means, the officials have the authority, to enter the number manually and then charge us. Maybe such mishap happened, but they entered wrong vehicle number. This is just a guess.

Usually, the amount gets deducted with in a minute or two. The delay of the arrival of the message and the way it was deducted clearly implies a manual entry, which then was deducted.

Best suggestion: Use a prepaid card like PayTm and only ensure you recharge as per your requirements. I usually do 750/- whenever i am travelling to Bangalore or to Hyderabad. Google maps clearly shows the amount of toll fee for a particular trip.

[livelyyoungman]

Oh! What an ordeal? Really unfortunate though it had a nice sweet ending. I am using PayTm FasTag and have not faced any issue till date. As mentioned in the previous post, I just keep enough money in the wallet. Hoping that I never get into such things in future.

[RRM]

Originally Posted by livelyyoungman

As mentioned in the previous post, I just keep enough money in the wallet.

My account balance at the time of deduction was less than 70/-

[shivraj737]

I faced a similar issue, at the Thane Mumbai entry toll. I crossed the toll at 8am and got the sms with toll deduction. Later after reaching work, I got another sms saying another 40Rs deducted at 9.10am. I checked my emails and had got 2 different emails as well.
My tag is ICICI fast tag. I called the customer care and it was very difficult to explain the situation to her. She kept saying that must be the return deduction, even after I told her I was still in Andheri.
Finally she agreed to raise a complaint and said it would take a month to resolve. A month later I got a message saying my claim is rejected as the toll deduction is valid.
So again I called them and explained the same thing, they again said will take upto a month. Thankfully after a couple of weeks I got a refund.
Since this experience I've been maintaining bare minimum balance in the fasttag account.

[AVash]

Originally Posted by Mr.U

The issue my family and I have faced are the opposite to this ie the toll system didn’t want to deduct any money and would say insufficient balance, even though we had enough money in the wallet. This was only with the paytm tags.

Is the amount in your wallet less than 200₹?
Paytm wallet doesn't have a provision for security deposit of around 200₹ and hence will display insufficient balance.

[sumeethaldankar]

This has happened to me earlier and has happened to me now again. First time happened with HDFC twice. My car was charged with toll all the way in Satara while my car was parked in Mumbai. HDFC refunded the money in 1-2 months. The Second instance I cancelled the tag and used a Paytm tag which I also had but was not being used. 4-5 months it was nice and quiet but just 2 weeks ago again got the same message that toll was deducted at the same earlier Satara toll booth for my car. Have raised request with Paytm and am awaiting their response.

I believe probably my issue was that I had two active fast tags and somehow something is wrong with the system somewhere that my toll is getting deducted against my vehicle no. I am planning to get the current Paytm tag cancelled and get another new one from them. I hope this is resolved as the amount charged at the toll is a hefty 110 as it is a highway toll booth.

[revsperminute]

A few months back, I was driving back from Pune with some friends and I stopped at Kinara Dhaba, Lonavala for lunch. I had to get off the expressway to access the Dhaba. I was charged toll for so many different roads at once.

What I was charged:
1. Expressway Toll for Pune to Mumbai
2. Expressway Toll from Lonavala to Mumbai
3. Old Pune Highway toll from Mumbai to Pune
4. Old Pune Highway toll from Pune to Mumbai

What I should have been charged:
1. Expressway toll from Pune to Lonavala
2. Expressway Toll from Lonavala to Mumbai
3. Old Pune highway toll (20.5 one way*2)

I was driving one of my dad’s cars and he asked me about it after a week it happened. Did not get a chance to follow up with it as I was super busy with my exams at the time.

Fastag often messes up when the car is making complicated trips. I’ve heard of many instances like mine.

[MT_Hyderabad]

Leave it like a rarest of rare instance. Millions of transactions are performed using Fastag and this is the first time I have seen such a thing being reported.

I also use ICICI fastag and have auto recharge once the balance falls below 500.
There is no problem if the account is attached to the fastag, if there is any rare movement of funds, I can easily get them back by calling them.
Yes, it take 25 to 30 days for resolution.

I face other issues though, sometimes they deduct 80 Rs when they had to deduct 40, it happened 3 to 4 times in that last 6 months and I got back the amount after giving them a call everytime this happened.

There is usually no wait times for these calls and you login a complaint in 5 mins and sleep over it for a month.
Much better than the endless frustration at the toll booths when Fastag was not there.

However, I will look into Fastag fund movement every month from now on, just to see if I missed an SMS of unaccounted deduction.

[shyampsunder]

Toll operators have the option to manually enter a car number and deduct charges if due to technical difficulties the actual RFID based deduction failed. Couple of scenarios I can think of:

1. Someone else is using your car number. If this occurs again or you get traffic challans, you can be sure that this is a high likelihood scenario.

2. Error in car number input for manual deduction.