Rental firms to profit from Dubai road toll

By Safura Rahimi - Arabian Business.

Rental car companies will charge customers as much as 25% extra to use the Dubai road toll, leaving them open to accusations of profiteering from the already controversial scheme.

Although Dubai's Roads and Transport Authority (RTA) yesterday confirmed that road toll charges remain at AED4 for all cars, there has been widespread agreement among rental car companies to charge customers more than 10% extra - AED4.50 per crossing - on top of toll charges.

The extra charges are being justified as an 'administrative fee' for costs incurred by companies setting up the Salik tags for each vehicle and creating separate departments to monitor the cars.

But Avis Car Rentals has said it is charging an additional AED1 as part of the admin fees for its rental car customers - a massive 25% extra on the charge levied by the RTA.

"Our rented car customers will be charged AED5 each time they cross the toll, while leased car customers will be charged 10% extra at the end of each month on top of their regular toll charges," Avis spokesperson Ahmed Younes told ArabianBusiness.com.

A spokesperson at Hertz told ArabianBusiness.com that the company will provide tags for all cars but that it will charge the 10% fee added to toll charges as well.

"It's like any other industry. The extra charge will cover setting up a new department to monitor the accounts, employing new staff, and so on," the spokesperson said.

The RTA has confirmed that rental car companies are responsible for providing road toll tags to customers of hired cars amid reports of confusion among rental car customers being told they must obtain the tags themselves.

"Rental companies each have to register their company name under one account and get enough tags to cover all their cars," an RTA spokesperson told ArabianBusiness.com.

"If a company has 50 cars it is responsible for getting 50 tags. Each one will have a different pin number and the tags are monitored and tracked back to the rental company through the account number," the spokesperson added.

The 'Salik' tags - to be placed on a car's dashboard - will be detected by sensors at toll gates, and allow a driver to be charged AED4 to enter the 'congestion zone' along Sheikh Zayed Road. Drivers face fines if they do not buy a tag.

Major car rental companies Avis and Hertz have both confirmed they will provide the tags to customers.

"We are responsible for delivering Salik tags to leased and rental car customers and for recharging the cards," Younes said. "We have to provide tags for any car that is under our account name."

However Younes also explained that customers renting as part of a 'group deal' of 100 or more cars are responsible for obtaining Salik tags themselves.

"We're setting up 'sub-accounts' for companies renting over 100 or so cars where all the cars are under one sub-account, which is under Avis' main account."

Drivers under sub-accounts are asked to provide their own Salik tags as it is easier for both parties if they monitor and pay their own toll payments, Younes added.

The RTA distributed 60,000 additional Salik tags this week to ensure motorists are prepared for the road toll's Sunday start after complaints flooded in that some vendors had run out of the tags.

The Dubai road toll is designed to reduce gridlock along Dubai's main Sheikh Zayed Road - which links the city's business districts - and is expected to generate revenues of AED600 million ($163.4 million) per year. The RTA has said it will use the money to fund other infrastructure projects to reduce traffic congestion.

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