So I'm going to share this with the Houston Board in hopes that someone has had a similar issue with HCTRA...

My husband and I moved to Houston on July 4th, 2017 and we got our EZ tag on 07/12/2017 with our Minnesota License plate. We registered our car and got a new license plate number in September. However, we forgot to update our license plate with EZ tag so our account shows our MN license plate. One year has passed and I received knowledge about this matter on yesterday, when I got a letter from Linebarger Goggan Blair & Sampson, LLP regarding an invoice of $48.50 from 10/21/2018. I thought it was a scam letter so I called Ez tag to report it. That's when they told me about an outwithstanding balance of $1630 that has sent to collection agency. At first, I was told nothing could be done about the fees sent to the collection agency and that I would have called the collection agency to pay for the fees. Then I asked to be transferred to a supervisor, who was able to reduce the fees to $635. (and this discount is only vaid for 48 hours, wtf). The fees that we kept getting were from our licnese number not matching our EZ tag account, which happened once we got our TX license plate in September last year, and the fees just kept accuring. They told us they mailed us invoices begining on April 2018 but we have never received any of them, or any information regarding this at all.

My husband went to Ez tag store today and they told us they have been mailing the invoices to our old address which we moved out in January this year. However, when we moved out, we updated our address with usps and dps right away. Also, we signed up for usps informed delivery daily digest when we moved out and usps was supposed to forward our mails to our current address.

So basically, as of yesterday, I was being notified that that I am being blind sided with an amount of money due to the toll road authority that could lavishly support a poverty stricken family for at least month, AND my credit will be adversely affected.

Has anyone been in, or know someone that has been in a similar situation? Did they end up working something out to owe less money? Is it worth it to get a lawyer working on it? Will the lawyer help with the credit score?

And seriously, **** ez tag. The only way they contact people is through mail while our phone and email should be on their file. Come on it's 2018.

Go to the EZTag office with records and talk to them.

We did, they told us $635 is the lowest they can do and the discount is only vaid for 48 hrs.

go to a different EZTag store.

That firm had to settle/drop a bunch of those claims last year. They arent a scam but frankly are.

did you pay for the tolls?

Nope. all the tolls since we changed our plate was not paid, so all the collection fees, admin fees and other fees added up.

You should be able to just pay back tolls

It should be a simple mistake

If the eztag store is no help then contact your commissioner

I'm pretty sure they can't touch your credit. HCTRA refuses to do pay by mail under the excuse that doing so would be them acting as a creditor.

(I had the same thing happen to me. Credit card expired. Fixed it as soon as I was notified, but eztag and txtag didn't communicate. The first notice I received was 5 years after the fact, sent to my parents address)

A nearly identical scenario happened to me earlier this year. Out of the blue, I received a huge stack of bills (50+ pages) from HCTRA for unpaid tolls that were from nearly a year before that. Each toll violation had an $11 fee plus the toll - added to something like $2500. So, they waited to notify me of this until it was a literal stack of bills! Turns out that when they gave me the toll tag, they didn't activate it, so I drove around for months unaware of that - and since we auto bill the monthly payment and have multiple cars with tags, I never noticed that I wasn't being charged on my car. Needless to say, I was pissed!

I went in person to the HCTRA office on BW8 just north of I-10 and spoke with them in person. Apparently, they just changed computer systems and this lack of notification happened to lots of people (shocking!). They immediately agreed to take off all fees and just allow me to pay the actual tolls - I think it was about $300. Fair resolution.

Sorry for the long story but I suggest going to that same office and should work out fine.

So what happened next?

We went to the same store, the store person told us that 635 is the lowest they can do and the discount is only valid for 48 hours.

Is the $635 a reduction of fees or simply the amount of tolls actually incurred? Mine was reduced to the tolls actually incurred (the ~$300), so I paid it since it owed it. If they are charging you more than the tolls (I.e. fees / late payments) I would talk to a manager and just tell them you are only willing to pay for the tolls.

aggietony2010 said:

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Somewhere there's a politician getting his pockets lines for the deal HCTRA has with this collection agency. It's a complete racket.

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Normally, that sounds like standard political conspiracy/corruption allegations, but in this case it is absolutely true.

The lawfirm, when Bill King was a partner, put numerous members of the state legislature on the payroll. Attorneys, non-attorneys, whatever, just career politicos w/ no real occupations or careers, had the lawfirm listed as their place of employment. The firm also hired countless government employees to come work for them in order to maintain ties. They also made lavish campaign contributions, and do all the wining and dining of officials.

And the collection fees are absolutely a scam. I rarely ever have to use the toll roads, and when I have I've always stopped and paid the tolls. Still got a collection letter from Linebarger, w/ zero details or invoice, just a demand for $78.

People need to start writing their county commissioners about this if they're Harris County residents. Probably won't do any good, but at least give them some grief about it.

Similar story here. Forgot to update my plates and months later received mail from EZ Tag saying I owed about $750. But I went online and saw they'd waived the fees and I just had to pay the cost of the tolls.

$635 for a year's worth of tolls actually might not be too far off.

you've been using the toll roads for a year and not paying for them? and now you are upset that you will have to pay? i'm not sure where the sympathy is supposed to go here. am i crazy?

My dad paid it because he was worried that it would impact his credit. I was willing to just ignore it/tell the law firm to pound sand.

If it's anything like mine...

I had 12 missed tolls of $0.80 each. Sent on 3 invoices with a $20 fee on each, plus $75 for each invoice sent to collections.

Oh, and all these happened on the same day. Apparently they're incapable of putting more than 4 tolls on an invoice. We literally had a toll from one gate on the same stretch of road on a separate invoice from the other gate 3 miles away, 5 minutes later. Clearly spread across invoices to maximize fees.

They refused to take anything but the "full $300".

I'm guessing the OP only has $40-50 in unpaid toll charges.

I had a similar situation. New Car and I forgot to update to permanent plate when it came in. Expired CC on file and I forgot to update it. If the EZ tag reader is down at a toll booth, they bill by license plate and if they don't have your license plate number on your account, they don't have a way to track you down.

I resolved all of it in July of this year and the resolution was basically tolls + $5 charge.

I bet 90-95% of the $635 covers the actual tolls and the fees are minimal. Ask the question and then pay the money. You used the toll road

DO NOT PAY THAT FULL AMOUNT. I had the same crap happen on my sons car. Same damn law firm etc. walked in and they wouldn't discount much of anything. I called and asked for a supervisor. Told them it was bull***** We have a tag and it works like it should. It always failed to read at a certain toll booth. Told them I don't dodge bills and pay what I owe but I wasn't paying this. Agreed to pay the portion of tolls for the bad toll reader and got out for $15.00 vs $1790

schmendeler said:

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you've been using the toll roads for a year and not paying for them? and now you are upset that you will have to pay? i'm not sure where the sympathy is supposed to go here. am i crazy?

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With the info we have now, I'm with you. Instead of repeating the same thing over and over op, why not research and find out what you owe in actual tolls. That'd be a good place to start.