The country’s toll operators agreed to conduct testing for the interoperability of their systems for fast, efficient, and seamless travel of motorists, the Department of Transportation said Monday.
SMC TPLEX Corp., Metro Pacific Tollways Corp., and NLEX Corp. signed the memorandum of agreement to jointly test the use of AutoSweep and EasyTrip radio frequency identification cashless toll payments for North Luzon Expressway, Tarlac-Pangasinan-La Union Expressway and Subic-Clark-Tarlac Expressway and determine the read rate percentage.
SMCTC, a subsidiary of the San Miguel Holdings Corp. and the concessionaire and the operator of TPLEX, uses the AutoSweep RFID tag.
MPTC, the investment holding company of NLEX Corp. uses the EasyTrip RFID tag for its electronic toll collection.
The test is part of the ongoing campaign by the DOTr, through the Toll Regulatory Board, to implement a policy of toll interoperability for the fast, efficient and seamless travel of motorists along various toll roads as the country continues to recover from the impact of the coronavirus disease 2019 pandemic.
Transportation Secretary Arthur Tugade expressed appreciation to the toll operators and concessionaires for their willingness to fast-track the necessary measures to fully implement the toll interoperability policy for the benefit of motorists and commuters, especially now that measures, such as strict physical distancing and cashless transactions, are being enforced to contain the spread of COVID-19.
“We are grateful to our private partners who have demonstrated their unparalleled support in this project. We need their assistance to fast-track the necessary measures to fully implement toll interoperability,” Tugade said.
Under the agreement, a steering committee will be created to implement and monitor the parties’ compliance with the agreement. An AutoSweep RFID sticker will be activated using an EasyTrip account, and an EasyTrip RFID sticker will be activated using an AutoSweep account. The test will involve 45 vehicles, composed equally of the different vehicle classifications.
The interoperability testing will be conducted for 14 consecutive days.
After the test, the participants will submit their test transaction reports and dashcam video recordings to the steering committee for validation and assessment. The steering committee has five days, from the complete submission of the data collected, to determine the read rate percentage or the system’s performance indicator when comparing RFID infrastructure.
