Texas Toll Booths Cater To Consumers
In Dallas, the North Texas Tollway Authority, an authority that is responsible for collecting tolls, has been scrutinized for months due to its toll collecting policy. This policy charges drivers who do not pay up at the toll booth fines of hundreds, or even thousands, of dollars. Because the NTTA has been under fire in the public eye, it announced today two steps it says that will target improving customer satisfaction.
The first part of the plan that the NTTA took was to permit all drivers to utilize the electronic toll collection lanes, including those who do not have one. They can do this without being punished with a twenty five dollar fine.
Before this plan, drivers without toll tags that utilized the electronic lanes on the Dallas North Tollway were looked at as violators and would subsequently be fined twenty five dollars for each time they passed through an electronic toll booth, rather than a cash booth.
But after February eighth, the drivers who don’t have a toll tag who use the electronic lanes will be given the chance to pay off the tolls before being hit with the additional twenty five dollar fine. But these toll charges will continue to be calculated at the cash rate, which is twice as high as the rates paid by toll tag consumers.
Unfortunately, the change won’t affect the NTTA’s collections policy in any other way and it will not stop consumers without toll tags who do not pay toll bills mailed to their homes from being charged twenty five dollars for every unpaid toll. This is a policy that can turn a week’s worth of tolls into a thousand dollar bill.
The NTTA’s second measure was to appoint an internal auditor as a mediator of some sort, which will be on hand to help frustrated customers who have first complained their way through NTTA customer service hierarchy without a result that they deemed to be satisfactory. The auditor will then review the account and determine if customer service and billing reps have followed their own rules.
Mallory McGuinness is employed by a debt collection agency. She also writes pieceson the credit industry , business, finance, and debt collection You can get a unique content version of this article from the Uber Article Directory.
Wyoming City Is Attempting To Collect
In the city of Cody, Wyoming, 219 utility accounts were sent for collection. Only four of the bills belonged to property owners. Some are suggesting that the city council consider holding property owners responsible for utility costs that their renters left unpaid. A policy like that could have added $180,000 to the city budget during the past five years, and furthermore, other utility users are subsidizing those that don’t pay their bills.
Landlords are offering fast and obvious objection, asking the city council why it should be their responsibility to pay for a bill that someone else racked up. Another plan has been proposed though, one that would require a deposit from every person opening up a utility account.
This change in policy would involve a number of modifications like a requirement that a property owner co-sign for a renter’s account. Tenants would be billed under their own account but have an open landlord account for each property. Unpaid bills would be transferred to the landlord’s account if the tenant doesn’t pay.
Deposit requirements would go from $150 to $200, and would be required for all accounts, regardless of their credit history in the past. Property owners would be notified of late payments, and they would be encouraged to contact the city to see if the bill got paid before returning rental deposits. All property owners would have to keep utilities in their names.
Supporters of the plan allege that it is not out of line with what other cities are doing, and it is a simpler and the most cost efficient way to collect debts. Collection agencies get about one third of what they collect in the city, and 60 percent of bills that go to collection remain unpaid.
No matter what decision they arrive to, it should be quick: city officials are noting a trend towards fewer people making deposits and more accounts being sent out for collection.
Mallory Megan works for a debt collection company. She also composes articles on business, finance, consumer spending and collection agencies. You are welcome to reprint this article – but get your own unique content version here.