When a Colorado woman received a collections letter for $232 worth of tolls on a road she had never used, she assumed that it was a scam. That would make the most sense, wouldn’t it? Then she learned that the road she was being billed has generated a lot of erroneous tolls for other people who had never driven on it. What’s going on here?
The Northwest Parkway Toll Road outside of Denver is open to all motorists, but privately funded and operated. As the name implies, you have to pay a toll, $3.50 per trip. There are no toll collectors, though: people who use the road regularly have transponders, and people who don’t use it regularly receive a bill at the address their car is registered to. That’s the kind of bill that this woman received and brought to CBS Denver for help.
A representative of the company that operates the road told CBS Denver that most complaints involve people who did use the road but never received their bills. Add in late fees and collection fees, and you can see how a bill for multiple trips can balloon to a few hundred dollars. Just… not when you never used the road.
Eventually, the power duo of the customer woman and the TV station worked together to figure out the source of the problem. There was a real toll miscreant, and she had the same last name as the woman who received the bill. One simple difference: the real toll-runner-upper is named Katharine, and the woman who received the collection notice is named Kathy. The company simply assumed they were the same person and sent her the bill.
Woman Gets $232 Collection Notice From Tollway She Never Drove On [CBS Denver]
by Laura Northrup via Consumerist
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