You can buy tickets at BOT stations while sitting at home.

The General Department of Roads has deployed propaganda on card pasting.automatic price collectionno stop for transport businesses at Giap Bat bus station (Hanoi).

Ms. Phan Thi Thu Hien, Deputy Director General of the Vietnam Road Administration, said that by the end of 2018, toll stations must implement automatic non-stop toll collection. However, up to now, the awareness of transport enterprises on this issue is still limited, many enterprises are still concerned about sticking automatic non-stop toll collection tags. "The tag sticking is free, only when the vehicle owner needs to use it, will they have to top up their transport account," Ms. Hien said.

According to Ms. Hien, non-stop toll collection will make BOT toll collection public and transparent. Using paper tickets as it is now does not transfer toll collection data to the General Department of Roads to control, publicize and make transparent the revenue of BOT investors. Non-stop electronic toll collection will overcome this shortcoming.

Non-stop toll collection will make BOT toll collection public and transparent.

Mr. Nguyen Manh Ha, General Director of VETC Non-Stop Toll Collection Company Limited, said that VETC will transfer all functions of paper tickets to electronic tickets, including single, monthly and quarterly tickets. For paper tickets, transport enterprises must buy them at toll stations, but for electronic tickets, they can be purchased (topped up) nationwide via electronic devices, some momo and Viettel channels. For now, VETC is applying a 3% discount promotion for vehicle owners at Dong Nai station and will study implementation at other stations if there is consensus from BOT investors.

“Instead of businesses having to “spread out” to buy monthly and quarterly tickets at the beginning of the month, when applying non-stop toll collection, businesses can buy tickets while sitting at home, without having to spend time monitoring and counting paper tickets to make tax settlement documents. Over 2 million vehicles will be given free tags for the first time,” said Mr. Ha, adding that each vehicle will be given an Etag, ensuring that the vehicle can pass the station at a speed of about 80 km/h without having to stop, helping businesses save time, fuel costs, and avoid vehicle wear and tear.

Many transport companies have affixed Etag cards right at the bus station.

From a business perspective, Mr. Trinh Anh Bao, Director of Dai Phat Travel Company, said that the company specializes in the Hanoi - Da Nang route and has used electronic fare collection since the first day. According to Mr. Bao, electronic fare collection has many benefits such as: reducing driving time for drivers, no more broken clutches like before. However, Mr. Bao said that the company currently has many vehicles using the same traffic account but cannot distinguish which vehicles have monthly tickets and which have quarterly tickets.

"Instead of selling monthly or quarterly tickets, we can offer a discount of how much if a business deposits money to use the non-stop toll collection service for a month with a certain limit," Mr. Bao suggested.

Sharing the same view, Mr. Pham Minh Hoang, Deputy General Director of the Southern Passenger Transport Enterprise, said that he fully supports the application of technology in management, which is always convenient and transparent. "The management agency needs to provide information about stations that have used non-stop toll collection cards and announce the route that stations must implement to make it more convenient for businesses to monitor and arrange appropriate business plans. In addition, VETC needs to provide full and timely card services to people and businesses," Mr. Hoang suggested.

Tran Duy