Published on May 12th, 2023 | by Sounder Rajen

12 Highway Concession Companies Agreed To implement An Open Toll System

These include Toll roads on DUKE, LDP, SPRINT, Kesas and NPE

Minister of Works of Malaysia, Dato Sri Alexander Nanta Linggi stated that as many as 12 highway concession companies have agreed to implement an open toll payment system starting this September. So does this mean Touch ‘N Go cards, Smart Tags and RFID will all become useless? Let’s find out.

Dato Sri Alexander also mentioned that these toll companies include the Lebuhraya Duta-Ulu Kelang Expressway (DUKE), Lebuhraya Damansara – Puchong (LDP), Skim Penyuraian Trafik KL Barat (SPRINT), Lebuhraya Shah Alam (Kesas), the SMART Tunnel as well as Lebuhraya Kuala Lumpur – Putrajaya (MEX).

Moreover, the remaining toll companies are Lebuhraya Sungai Besi, Lebuhraya Baru Pantai (NPE), Lebuhraya Bertingkat Ampang-Kuala Lumpur (Akleh), Lebuhraya Koridor Guthrie, Jambatan Pulau Pinang dan Lebuhraya Butterworth-Kulim (BKE), Dato Sri Alexander stated.

After visiting the Traffic Monitoring Center (TMC) Menara Korporat, Persada PLUS in Subang yesterday, Dato Sri Alexander said, “So far, these are the highway concession companies that have agreed to implement an open toll payment system. We are still negotiating with the rest and we hope others will come forward as well.”

Dato Sri Alexander explained that the reason negotiations with the highway concession companies take a lot of time is because both parties will need to thoroughly examine the security risks that may result from using credit or debit cards for toll payments and that the Government wants to avoid any of these issues arising.

On top of that, Dato Sri Alexander also mentioned that this new open toll system will be implemented around mid-September as part of a Government initiative to give the people more choice for toll payment methods aside from just the usual Touch ‘N Go cards, Smart Tag and RFID, the latter of which has had its fair share of issues.

As far as highway road repairs go, Dato Sri Alexander said that preliminary work is already underway including the widening of the Pasir Gudang and Sedenak, Johor highway routes which involves an allocation of RM525 million, so it is clear that the average Malaysian highway experience is about to be improved on multiple facets.

Dato Sri Alexander concluded with, “This allocation falls under Budget 2023 and when it was approved, the initial work was already done and we will now hand the reins over to PLUS to fully implement the overall works.”

So, the key takeaway here is that Dato Sri Alexander clearly stated that this new open toll payment system is meant to give highway users more flexibility and choices when it comes to payment options at the toll roads and not to phase out the existing methods, at least for now, anyway.