Despite Estradas de Portugal's assurance that sabotage at the toll gates on Via do Infante would have no consequences for users, the truth is that the automatic systems – at least Via Verde – recorded double journeys until the functioning of the gantries was reset.
O Sul Informação found that this failure affects the vehicles of residents or companies that are exempt from paying tolls on 10 trips and that, due to the non-operation of one or more gates, they reached spend three of your trips for free when in reality they only made one trip.
Is that, for example, on a trip between Lagoa and Faro, on December 13, after the attack the day before the gantry located near the Boliqueime node, instead of the system counting only one trip, due to the failure of the sabotaged gantry, it recorded two trips: one with entry into Lagoon and exit at Guia, another immediately after, entering Loulé and exiting at Faro.
In other words, since the Boliqueime portico is out of order, the system did not account for the passage of vehicles through that location, so it is as if the car had left before and entered later, which would mean two trips and not just one.
In one day, with round trip Lagoa-Faro e Faro-Loulé, instead of spending two trips with exemption, each vehicle effectively spent four.
And the problem worsened on the 14th, when, in addition to the portico of the Boliqueime node, the one at Guia was vandalized and did not work for a long time. In a single trip, it was as if the same car took three different routes…
So far, few people have noticed this double (or even triple) billing for the same trip, because most people chose, because it is cheaper, not to receive a bill by mail at home and just consult their data on the portal. Green Way.
But the Sul Informação had access to the data of several people who verified the double registration of trips in Via do Infante. And you also know that complaints have already started to reach Via Verde and Via Livre.
One of the cases occurred on December 13, when the vehicle entered Lagoa at 10:47:53 and only left the A22 at the junction of Faro, at 11:21:38 am, taking just over 35 minutes on the way. But Via Verde records this single trip as two – one entering Lagoa and leaving Guia, at 10:54:59, the other entering Loulé, at 11:10:50 and leaving at Faro, at the time indicated above. In the middle is the portico of Boliqueime, which at 2:40 am on the 12th had been shot and therefore had been unused for a long time.
Estradas de Portugal said at the time that this sabotage did not affect the users of Via do Infante, because the data of the cars that passed by were stored and then, when the connections to the central system were restored, this data would be transmitted. But after all, for the documents to which the Sul Informação had access, that's not what happened.
Another case is that of a group of four colleagues from a State body, who live in Portimão and work in Faro, and that every week they share the car of one of them to take advantage of the 10 free trips on Via do Infante (five working days with two trips per day).
What was the surprise of the vehicle owner in the week between December 12th and 16th when she went to consult her balance on the Via Verde portal on the internet and found that, instead of being counted, each day, two trips (one of going to Portimão-Faro and another back), two or even three were being counted, as if he had been entering and exiting Via do Infante. The result is that, in that week alone, he spent 11.05 euros on tolls, which he was wrongly charged due to the failure of the gantry.
“We have combined this system of, each week, we use one of our cars, to take advantage of the 10 exemption trips and thus never pay tolls. But now what was our astonishment when we found out that they were overcharging us," said one of those affected to Sul Informação.
Checking the undue charge, users have been calling Via Verde, explaining the situation and trying to find out how the problem will be resolved. In one case, the answer was that Via Verde was not aware of the problem and that it had nothing to do with this issue, as it does not manage the tolls but only sells the automatic device. Therefore, informed the Via Verde employee, the problem will have to be resolved by Via Livre, the real manager of the automatic toll system on the A22. But, at the user's insistence, once the system was contracted with Via Verde, an email was provided ([email protected]) to which the complaint should be sent, having been given the guarantee that “Via Verde would deal with the complaint with Via Livre”.
However, in other cases reported to the Sul Informação, the customer service employee at Via Verde was not so helpful and limited himself to advising customers to complain directly to Via Livre.
As far as it was possible to ascertain, both entities have already received dozens and dozens of phone calls and complaints in recent days, and more will follow when users begin to notice the extra trips that were accounted for and charged.
However, the Sul Informação also found that not all were harmed by the failures of registration of the frames. Those who do not have electronic devices and circulated on Via do Infante on those days paid less tolls, because fewer sections were registered…
What to do?
If you have a Via Verde device, start by going to the website viaverde.pt, register to gain access to your account, and check if you have extra billing.
To better control your spending on tolls, remember that the sabotages took place on the 12th (gantry next to the Boliqueime node), on the 13th at night (the gateway next to the Guia node), on the 17th (again affecting the gateway from Boliqueime, although sabotage was carried out off the A22) and on the 27th (off the A22, probably affecting the portico between Olhão and Tavira).
If you notice any anomaly in what was charged/invoiced, you can call the Via Verde Customer Service Line 707 500 900 (but note: it only works on weekdays, from 8:30 am to 20:30 pm).
Or you can choose to send an email to [email protected], exposing their complaint, which, as guaranteed by the operator who attended the Customer Support Line, will then be forwarded to Via Livre.
Or you can contact Via Livre (www.vialivre.pt) directly, by telephone 707 201 292 or by email [email protected], exposing the case and asking for the refund of the excess charged.
When and how this will be done is that no one has yet been able to explain to the Sul Informação. But with the predictable rise in complaints, now that everyone is becoming aware of the problem, some action will have to be taken quickly.
If you want to share your case, send us your experience to the email [email protected] and tell us what happened to you!
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