Velasco urges DOTr to extend deadline for installing RFID stickers to end-Q1 2021

Speaker Lord Allan Velasco is urging the Department of Transportation to extend until the first quarter of 2021 the deadline for the installation of radio-frequency identification (RFID) stickers on vehicles as part of the cashless toll system amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

In a statement on Monday, Velasco noted that all 6.1 million registered vehicles in Metro Manila, Calabarzon, and Central Luzon may not be provided with RFID stickers by January 11, 2021, the deadline set for the installation of these tags.

The DOTr, he added, should also consider the possibility that the pandemic has constrained many vehicle owners from leaving their homes and have these RFID tags installed.

“It would be more practicable if the deadline is further extended to March 31, 2021 to give all our motorists enough time to secure the stickers for the cashless payment system given that we are still in a pandemic where movement of people is limited,” Velasco said.

Velasco likewise shared the observations during the meeting of the House Committee on Transportation last November 25 in anticipation of the problems that could arise from the implementation of the cashless toll system on December 1.

The committee, for one, pointed out that it would take more than two years for all vehicles using tollways to be given RFID tags.

Transportation panel chair Edgar Sarmiento also noted that it took an average of a year and a half before Thailand and Indonesia went fully cashless, while the Philippines was aiming to do it barely five months after the DOTr issued the memorandum for the cashless toll system.

“The concerned agencies should have ensured first the feasibility of going cashless in the amount of time given to vehicle owners,” Velasco said.

"Instead, the implementation on December 1 looked like a dry-run. This defeats the purpose of having our tollways becoming efficient in going cashless," he added.

The DOTr earlier called on toll operators to intensify off-site RFID installations such as in malls, gas stations and other strategic locations “so that people will no longer need to go to the tollgates to have their RFIDs installed.”

Autosweep tags are issued by the San Miguel Corporation (SMC) for the Skyway, South Luzon Expressway (SLEx), STAR Tollway, Tarlac–Pangasinan–La Union Expressway (TPLEx), Ninoy Aquino International Airport Expressway (NAIAx), and the Muntinlupa-Cavite Expressway (MCX).

Easytrip, on the other hand, is issued by the Metro Pacific Tollways Corporation (MPTC) to be used on the North Luzon Expressway (NLEx), Subic-Clark-Tarlac Expressway (SCTEx), Cavite Expressway (CAVITEx), C5 Southlink, and Cavite-Laguna Expressway (CALAX). — BM, GMA News