Easy Pass

[RayHope]

Hi everyone, I am a new member, and I dont know how to use this site propperly, the other day I tried to post a question that I need some help with, but I cant viewe it and there are no replys sent to me, so I assume I dident post it correctly. So here goes again:-

I have recently got an Easy Pass, and yes very easy to get, but, when I asked them how to use it, not so easy. The package came with the easy pass lump thing, and a smart card and a booklet (all in Thai), my thai girlfriend feels unable to translate for me because she says her English is not up to it!

Any way the gaget thing must go in the window and will work (if it does) in the easy pass lanes at the toll booths.

But what is the smart card for is there smart card readers in the pay booths or do I use the thing as a sort of cash card to top the thing up somehow??

I regually travel from Buri Ram to Hua Hin and after I bought the package, there were no more Easy Pass lanes for the rest of the journey, I tried to ask at the toll booths but NO English was the reply, so HELP!!

Ray Hope

[a51mas]

From what I understand when your account has less than 200 bahts credit, the sensor beeps twice to remind you to top up the account, you then go to the lane with yellow sign "cash/top up" and use your smart card to top up (minimum 500 bahts/maximum 5,000 bahts)

[Crossy]

When you get low just hand the smart card along with the amount you want to reload plus the toll for the particular plaza you're at to the attendant in a top-up lane.

The booth operators invariably know what I want despite my awful Thai.

[AjarnPasa]

The lump goes on the windscreen immediately behind the rearview mirror - and stays there, except in system snafus (see below).

You drive through the easy pass lane, leaving 5 metres between the rear of the car in front and your car. Don't keep the lump in your handbag and wave it out of the window as you reach the toll booth. Not only will it signal to everyone who is watching that you are a tight-wad who, presumably able to buy numerous cars, is too stingy to splash out on more than one easy pass between them, but will also be too late as you will have passed the sensor by then. You will then have to hold up the line of cars behind you for an interminable length of time while the dude in the box sorts out the mess you have just made, thus rendering the easy pass lane utterly counterproductive for all the people in line behind you!

The card is used when you want to top up the your credit. You can do this at a couple of high street bank chains. Alternatively, while driving, pass through the 'Cash/Top Up' lane where you hand over the cash and your card and wait while you're topped up. You are sometimes asked to pay the toll as well. For example if you hand over 1000 baht they credit your EasyPass with 1000 baht, but then you need to pay the toll for the crossing that you are making. Sometimes they credit your card with 955 and keep the 45 for the current crossing, or whatever. Don't try doing this in the easy pass lane. See previous answer

Sometimes, through no fault of your own (i.e. not waving your pass out the window, not leaving it in your handbag, not driving too close to the car in front, and not not having any credit left) the system malfunctions and you will have to hand over the lump to the toll booth dude. He does some magic on it and you're good to go. But you have held up the easy pass lane and now everyone behind you is irked because they think you did it on purpose.

An LED display tells you how much the current crossing has just cost you and shows you the balance of your credit. This, being the Fisher-Price-cheapest-option-toll-road-automation-system, is sometimes wrong - keep your receipts.

And finally, don't forget to wonder why the heck you ever bothered with Easy Pass at all as you sit 20 cars deep in the single easy pass lane, waiting for the person at the front to fish their easy pass out of their handbag, watching cars whizz by your left and right in the normal lanes just to see them cut in at the head of the queue.

Oh, and don't try to use it on any toll roads that are not operated by EXAT.