How FNB shook up highway travelling in SA

Hanno Labuschagne

Hanno Labuschagne

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How FNB shook up highway travelling in SA

FNB's rollout of tap-to-pay points at toll plazas on South Africa's highways is one of the best changes to long-distance road travel in the country. This is true even for people who are not FNB customers.

As someone who prefers not to use a credit card, I was forced to carry cash for long-distance journeys, as South African toll booths previously wouldn't accept debit cards.
 
I solved that for the odd occasions that I use a toll road, by getting a etag, and it lives in a nice aluminium box all the time it is not actually needed, so as to both improve battery life (they get interrogated by all the signs and by gantries along the road, to do traffic management and get average speed amongst other things) and also to reduce the number of entities tracking my every movement. I used to have a fuel card, and those were regularly cloned, and then got used by fuel stations to fill up fuel for a few times, till it hit the soft limit the bank puts on it, and I was stuck needing to have the company file the dispute, and then collect a new card from the bank. So I never was going to use my personal card at a toll plaza, I would put the exact change needed for each plaza in a ziploc bank bag, with a small paper inside for the location and amount written down, and simply handed this to the operator, and was away in a few seconds. Made it almost as easy as the etag, and no change needed as well.
 
Justanotherguybythesea said:
I solved that for the odd occasions that I use a toll road, by getting a etag, and it lives in a nice aluminium box all the time it is not actually needed, so as to both improve battery life (they get interrogated by all the signs and by gantries along the road, to do traffic management and get average speed amongst other things) and also to reduce the number of entities tracking my every movement. I used to have a fuel card, and those were regularly cloned, and then got used by fuel stations to fill up fuel for a few times, till it hit the soft limit the bank puts on it, and I was stuck needing to have the company file the dispute, and then collect a new card from the bank. So I never was going to use my personal card at a toll plaza, I would put the exact change needed for each plaza in a ziploc bank bag, with a small paper inside for the location and amount written down, and simply handed this to the operator, and was away in a few seconds. Made it almost as easy as the etag, and no change needed as well.
Click to expand...

So much effort when you could just tap on the little screen and never hand your card over to anyone and not have to worry about random cash in your car to pay for toll roads.
 
ToxicBunny said:
So much effort when you could just tap on the little screen and never hand your card over to anyone and not have to worry about random cash in your car to pay for toll roads.
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The rest was in the days before, going back at least 3 decades. When SAPO worked, Eskom was not load shedding, and you got water out of the tap, and roads were not potholes with a layer of tar between them.
 
Justanotherguybythesea said:
I solved that for the odd occasions that I use a toll road, by getting a etag, and it lives in a nice aluminium box all the time it is not actually needed, so as to both improve battery life (they get interrogated by all the signs and by gantries along the road, to do traffic management and get average speed amongst other things) and also to reduce the number of entities tracking my every movement. I used to have a fuel card, and those were regularly cloned, and then got used by fuel stations to fill up fuel for a few times, till it hit the soft limit the bank puts on it, and I was stuck needing to have the company file the dispute, and then collect a new card from the bank. So I never was going to use my personal card at a toll plaza, I would put the exact change needed for each plaza in a ziploc bank bag, with a small paper inside for the location and amount written down, and simply handed this to the operator, and was away in a few seconds. Made it almost as easy as the etag, and no change needed as well.
Click to expand...
No thanks, I prefer FNB's way rather than go through all that kak. Processing a transaction in that amount of time compared to a standard POS transaction, while linking it to the boom, is actually pretty cool or everyone would be doing it...
 
Justanotherguybythesea said:
I solved that for the odd occasions that I use a toll road, by getting a etag, and it lives in a nice aluminium box all the time it is not actually needed, so as to both improve battery life (they get interrogated by all the signs and by gantries along the road, to do traffic management and get average speed amongst other things) and also to reduce the number of entities tracking my every movement. I used to have a fuel card, and those were regularly cloned, and then got used by fuel stations to fill up fuel for a few times, till it hit the soft limit the bank puts on it, and I was stuck needing to have the company file the dispute, and then collect a new card from the bank. So I never was going to use my personal card at a toll plaza, I would put the exact change needed for each plaza in a ziploc bank bag, with a small paper inside for the location and amount written down, and simply handed this to the operator, and was away in a few seconds. Made it almost as easy as the etag, and no change needed as well.
Click to expand...

@ToxicBunny and @Mike Hoxbig he is saying how he did it before, he has an etag now which is even simpler than tapping, do not even have to open your window to tap on a cold morning like today.
 
supersunbird said:
@ToxicBunny and @Mike Hoxbig he is saying how he did it before, he has an etag now which is even simpler than tapping, do not even have to open your window to tap on a cold morning like today.
Click to expand...

Except he keeps the eTag in a tinfoil lined box and all that...

So tinfoil hat territory, but still gives into Big Brother anyway.
 
Justanotherguybythesea said:
I solved that for the odd occasions that I use a toll road, by getting a etag, and it lives in a nice aluminium box all the time it is not actually needed, so as to both improve battery life (they get interrogated by all the signs and by gantries along the road, to do traffic management and get average speed amongst other things) and also to reduce the number of entities tracking my every movement. I used to have a fuel card, and those were regularly cloned, and then got used by fuel stations to fill up fuel for a few times, till it hit the soft limit the bank puts on it, and I was stuck needing to have the company file the dispute, and then collect a new card from the bank. So I never was going to use my personal card at a toll plaza, I would put the exact change needed for each plaza in a ziploc bank bag, with a small paper inside for the location and amount written down, and simply handed this to the operator, and was away in a few seconds. Made it almost as easy as the etag, and no change needed as well.
Click to expand...
That aluminum box is clever.

I have an e-tag just for the Du Toitskloof tunnel in Cape Town and the Tsitsikamma one when I go down to the South coast.

I thought leaving it in the cubby hole would be fine for if I drive up to Joburg again.
 
Much nice innovation. SANRAL must love it good.
Maybe they can also add a "donate R50 to government" option at their merchant pay points for those who are tired of saving all those hopeless KFC kids 2 rand at a time.
 
Pegging said:
That aluminum box is clever.

I have an e-tag just for the Du Toitskloof tunnel in Cape Town and the Tsitsikamma one when I go down to the South coast.

I thought leaving it in the cubby hole would be fine for if I drive up to Joburg again.
Click to expand...
No needs to be in a conductive box, the plastic dashboard is transparent to RF energy. I use an old one that used to be used for a tyre pressure gauge from BMW, which never worked in the first place.
 
ToxicBunny said:
Except he keeps the eTag in a tinfoil lined box and all that...

So tinfoil hat territory, but still gives into Big Brother anyway.
Click to expand...
you are replying using a browser either on desktop or phone, which also gives a lot of info away, like location, and a whole host of other info. At least 4 trackers at a minimum
 
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