A damn expensive run on the toll road

When we went out of town a couple weeks ago, we took the toll road (3 tolls). And when we came back, we also took the same toll road (again 3 tolls). I have an EZ Tag so I thought nothing of it.

Got a Toll Road violation notice in the mail yesterday. Seems my credit card on file had expired in April. My account balance then dipped below zero when we went out of town. So now my account was locked and I got hit for the 6 tolls PLUS $75 in violation fines!!! And the only way to unlock my account was to pay the full amount

I do accept some fault- I set up the account so long ago that the email address on file was a really old (now non-existent) email address. I have had that EZ Tag account for so long, and I never bother to look at the account- I just have it on auto-pilot. Never even crossed my mind to check the email address or the credit card on file. So I never got the notices they emailed me letting me know the card had expired.

Well that sucks. It's one of those rare downsides of automated payments: out of sight, out of mind

I traded in a car once at a dealership in Katy, and a couple days later some jokers blew through some toll road stops in it, so they sent ME the bill since when they looked it up it was apparently still registered to me. Thankfully I got it taken care of without having to pay anything, but it took a few phone calls and some faxes of paperwork from the dealership, etc.

Legally change your name to "N2ROCK" and apply for a new EZ tag

Did you contact HCTRA? I've had something similar happen and each time I called and got the fees waived....in my case, I think everything was up to date but the EZ tag reader didn't read my tag and I got the fees/tickets as though I was an illegal toll road user. For my instances, they were very nice and helpful over the phone.


....Or you could go to the HCTRA main offices and start winching cars out onto the feeder road until they waive the $75 fees LOL!

I don't trust those tags. I have the NTTA tag and you have to "pre pay" aka have a account of money that it pulls from when you go through the toll ways. Problem is I have over 50 bucks in there from work and I got a bill last month for around 4 bucks and a list of the toll roads I went through with the pic and all. So did I just put 50 bucks in the pot for nothing? I think so.