fellow Texans - or anyone - DMV and TxTag

Rushie

Rushie

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Rushie
So yesterday we get a bill from TxTag saying we owe $3.45. This is a surprise since I paid off the last bill-me-by-camera toll several months ago, or so I thought.

I was suspicious back then. Back then it was a ZipCash bill addressed to "Rent-A-Center" at (our correct street address) needless to say we aren't a rent-a-center but we had driven what they claimed and the picture was our tag. I called them on the phone about the "Rent-A-Center" and the lady looked up the tag with the DMV and said the DMV had our correct name and address, the "Rent-A-Center" must be some database criss-cross. So I paid it, it was about $13.

So why another bill? I put the "account number" into the TxTag website and come up with a page that says not only do I owe $3.45 now, there is an additional outstanding $23 that has been sent to collections, in red letters. Wha??? More digging and I find out that they had sent numerous bills and now we are one step away from a Class C misdemeanor and impoundment of our vehicle.

As I am looking at these "numerous bills" online, I notice that all except this most recent one were sent to (My husband's name) XXXX Main St. Houston TX. That is not our address, we live three hours west of Houston. So I get on Google Maps and go to that address and guess what? It is a Rent-A-Center. So, the Rent-A-Center got (and presumably trashed) six bills.

So the next thing I did is call up the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles. I explain what's going on and after being put on hold the lady comes back and says I will have to submit a change of address form. What for? I ask, ZipCash told me you have the correct information. She says the DMV has 3 addresses for each vehicle, the owner's address, the physical address of the vehicle's location, and the mailing address.

Okay says I, what do you have there as our 3 addresses? Well she can't tell me over the phone but she can give me the zip codes, and she tells me the owner's address (our zip), the car's physical location (a HOUSTON zip) and the mailing address (our zip).

So why was TxTag mailing the bills to the car's physical location and not the mailing address? And why did they suddenly change and mail the last one to the correct address?

And who is ZipCash? I'm not sure but I think maybe they are the "collection agent" because the payment I gave them apparently WAS applied to the account, but it didn't clear all the charges. Or possibly ZipCash is associated only with the North Texas Tollway Authority and that payment only covered our Dallas/Ft. Worth trips. The Austin area might be additional.

And most of all: how on earth did DMV get that address? We certainly didn't give it to them.

I thought maybe someone was cloning our tag but I also looked up all our charges and they are all ours, nobody is going around running up toll bills with a copy of our tag.

TxTag posted a credit the same day I made the ZipCash payment but the amounts don't match, what they posted was greater by about $5. I think they added my payment to a credit for removing a fee or something. The statement was NOT very clear, it just gave a "Payments and Credits" total. I tried to call TxTag on the phone, the line was busy all day.

So have any of you ever had confusion with the DMV, addresses, toll bills from either NTTA ZipCash or TxTag that could give me any insight into what's going on here?
 
Rushie said:
And who is ZipCash?
Click to expand...
From the North Texas Tollway Authority (NTTA) website, it explains that ZipCash is a system that permits folks without the RFID tag to use the toll roads, and be sent a bill through the mail:

ZipCash offers a pay-by-mail option at higher rates for customers who do not have a TollTag. TollTag customers receive the lowest toll rates on NTTA roads; ZipCash customers pay at least 50 percent more than TollTag users.

When a motorist without a TollTag drives through tolling points, high-speed cameras take digital images of the license plate, and the tolls are billed to the registered owner of the vehicle.
​

My experience with issues like this and dealing with the Texas DMV, even as a used parts seller and a used car dealer, is that the more complicated the issue the more important it is to go to their regional office to speak with the right human. And often the more senior supervisors. For Houston, that will be at 2110 Governors Circle, near where Hwy 290 and 610 intersect.

One idea to stop this is to ask that new license plates be issued for your vehicles. That would "reboot" the system to have the right information for you, hubby, cars, locations, and all associated with the new plates that hopefully have no association with anyone else.

With the total charges owed being less than $50, I am not one to put much effort in fighting this. Yes, they wronged you, but you could expend much more than that to fight the fight, and they may never fix what caused the problem.

So I would be headed down to the toll road authority office and pay the bill. Why go to the office to make payment? I want something directly from them documenting the debt was paid in full and no more was owed. This way if a debt collector does call about that money, I can say in a sickenly sweet southern grandma tone.

"Why honey child! I am so happy you called about this. Can I get your mailing address please? Why? Well, I'd like to send you 1) documentation that this debt has been paid in full; 2) a copy of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act; 3) directions to the local lake; and 4) jumping instructions."​

If the amount of money owed was more, then I would maybe fight. Including investigating how a connection between me and Rent-a-Center was established. Was it a recycled plate number? Are plate numbers similar? Did a Rent-a-Center alter the plate so it is my number?

But for a low dollar amount, it's not worth the increased blood pressure.
 
AggieMike88 said:
From the North Texas Tollway Authority (NTTA) website, it explains that ZipCash is a system that permits folks without the RFID tag to use the toll roads, and be sent a bill through the mail:

ZipCash offers a pay-by-mail option at higher rates for customers who do not have a TollTag. TollTag customers receive the lowest toll rates on NTTA roads; ZipCash customers pay at least 50 percent more than TollTag users.

When a motorist without a TollTag drives through tolling points, high-speed cameras take digital images of the license plate, and the tolls are billed to the registered owner of the vehicle.
​

My experience with issues like this and dealing with the Texas DMV, even as a used parts seller and a used car dealer, is that the more complicated the issue the more important it is to go to their regional office to speak with the right human. And often the more senior supervisors. For Houston, that will be at 2110 Governors Circle, near where Hwy 290 and 610 intersect.

One idea to stop this is to ask that new license plates be issued for your vehicles. That would "reboot" the system to have the right information for you, hubby, cars, locations, and all associated with the new plates that hopefully have no association with anyone else.

With the total charges owed being less than $50, I am not one to put much effort in fighting this. Yes, they wronged you, but you could expend much more than that to fight the fight, and they may never fix what caused the problem.

So I would be headed down to the toll road authority office and pay the bill. Why go to the office to make payment? I want something directly from them documenting the debt was paid in full and no more was owed. This way if a debt collector does call about that money, I can say in a sickenly sweet southern grandma tone.

"Why honey child! I am so happy you called about this. Can I get your mailing address please? Why? Well, I'd like to send you 1) documentation that this debt has been paid in full; 2) a copy of the Fair Debt Collection Practices Act; 3) directions to the local lake; and 4) jumping instructions."​

If the amount of money owed was more, then I would maybe fight. Including investigating how a connection between me and Rent-a-Center was established. Was it a recycled plate number? Are plate numbers similar? Did a Rent-a-Center alter the plate so it is my number?

But for a low dollar amount, it's not worth the increased blood pressure.
Click to expand...

Awesome. This is all very helpful. Thanks!!
 
I am confused about how the state would know the physical address. Is that what the insurance company calls the garaged address?

The only issue I have ever had with the system was when they misread a plate and erroneously billed me. I went on-line and looked up the image they had and saw they misread a B as an 8. Filled out their on-line appeal form and bill was rescinded the next day.

Your posts remind me of Roseanne Rosanadanna, Rushie. It's always something.
 
Van Johnston said:
I am confused about how the state would know the physical address. Is that what the insurance company calls the garaged address?

The only issue I have ever had with the system was when they misread a plate and erroneously billed me. I went on-line and looked up the image they had and saw they misread a B as an 8. Filled out their on-line appeal form and bill was rescinded the next day.

Your posts remind me of Roseanne Rosanadanna, Rushie. It's always something.
Click to expand...

Haha! That happened to us once too and an easy fix. The camera indeed misread a plate.

Their change of address form has a section where you can write in the physical address "if different". If you leave it, and the mailing address blank, the owner address is supposed to automatically populate the other two. The more I think about it, it seems the most logical explanation is that there must have been a car with that tag number at that address in the past and when it got turned in they didn't clear the address and when they gave it to us they didn't populate the field. It's probably nothing more than that causing the whole thing. In which case Nevermind! I loved Roseanne Roseannadanna.
 
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So I might not be so quick to blow it off. Even a small amount. For something like this, I'm of the scortched-earth school of thought.

Why?

Because when they built the toll roads in the DC suburbs, the tolling authority got it wrong. Multiple times. Failed to bill, wrong plates, missed toll tag reads, you name it. And they didn't bill timely, to the point where the fines added up to more - much, much more - than the tolls themselves. Like $1,000-$2,000 in penalties on a $5.00 toll. To the tune of thousands of dollars to some of the folks. The state wouldn't (or couldn't) do much, the toll authority filed suit. The customers counter sued. It became a really ugly situation. And folks couldn't get tags renewed. Judge finally found that the fines were excessive, but the baseline tolls were valid. A selltelemt was reached.

Given that there is a misdemeanor on the line, and given what I've seen from the Sharks up here, I'd be inclined to not let this go.
 
wsuffa said:
So I might not be so quick to blow it off. Even a small amount. For something like this, I'm of the scortched-earth school of thought.

Why?

Because when they built the toll roads in the DC suburbs, the tolling authority got it wrong. Multiple times. Failed to bill, wrong plates, missed toll tag reads, you name it. And they didn't bill timely, to the point where the fines added up to more - much, much more - than the tolls themselves. Like $1,000-$2,000 in penalties on a $5.00 toll. To the tune of thousands of dollars to some of the folks. The state wouldn't (or couldn't) do much, the toll authority filed suit. The customers counter sued. It became a really ugly situation. And folks couldn't get tags renewed. Judge finally found that the fines were excessive, but the baseline tolls were valid. A selltelemt was reached.

Given that there is a misdemeanor on the line, and given what I've seen from the Sharks up here, I'd be inclined to not let this go.
Click to expand...

Thanks, this is the kind of feedback I'm looking for. I don't have much experience with toll roads but I'm not surprised at least one entity got it all screwed up.

I am assuming that the TxTag people, or ZipCash, or NTTA, whoever is billing and tracking this is completely separate from the DMV and that correcting the address with the DMV is not automatically going to make this go away. I intend to follow it up to the bitter end.
 
The timeliness of this thread is hilarious.

I was in the Dallas area in late March for a business meeting and used some toll roads.

I received an invoice in the mail from the North Texas Tollway Autority (NTTA) in late June, a full three months later. The total tolls, a whopping $3.81.

So I laughed at the inefficiency of the system and dropped a check in the mail to them using the provided envelope.

Fast forward to last week, and I get another invoice, this one marked "1st notice of non-payment." It was for $13.81...and included a $10 late charge. (Which is my understanding is illegal, I seem to recall that late charges can't be over 18% per annum, but I'm confident that govt entities have excluded themselves from this cap.)

Pffft. Really? I check my business account and, sure enough, the original check hadn't cleared yet.

So, I write another check, this one made out to something like "NTTA, stooopid f***ers." I put it in the provided return envelope and I completely seal it in two layers of clear packing tape then vacuum pack it.

Then I placed that envelope in a 1/2 size Manila envelope and wrote on the outside: "don't lose this one, dip$hits." And completely wrapped it in two layers of packing tape and vacuum packed it.

Oh, and I also put sheets of 29 ga sheet metal in both envelopes, cut to the exact size of each envelope, so they can't just cut them open with a scissors. (Yeah, I was bored that evening)

Then I placed that into a full size Manila envelope and sent it certified mail so I'd have proof they received it this time.

They got it on Thursday.

My original check cleared on Friday.

Coincidence?

I think not.

I'll be interested to see if they cash the second one also...although I don't really care if they do, they deserve it, they'll spend that much in labor getting to it! ;-)
 
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timwinters said:
The timeliness of this thread is hilarious.

I was in the Dallas area in late March for a business meeting and used some toll roads.

I received an invoice in the mail from the North Texas Tollway Autority (NTTA) in late June, a full three months later. The total tolls, a whopping $3.81.

So I laughed at the inefficiency of the system and dropped a check in the mail to them using the provided envelope.

Fast forward to last week, and I get another invoice, this one marked "1st notice of non-payment." It was for $13.81...and included a $10 late charge. (Which is my understanding is illegal, I seem to recall that late charges can't be over 18% per annum, but I'm confident that govt entities have excluded themselves from this cap.)

Pffft. Really? I check my business account and, sure enough, the original check hadn't cleared yet.

So, I write another check, this one made out to something like "NTTA, stooopid f***ers." I put it in the provided return envelope and I completely seal it in two layers of clear packing tape then vacuum pack it.

Then I placed that envelope in a 1/2 size Manila envelope and wrote on the outside: "don't lose this one, dip$hits." And completely wrapped it in two layers of packing tape and vacuum packed it.

Oh, and I also put sheets of 29 ga sheet metal in both envelopes, cut to the exact size of each envelope, so they can't just cut them open with a scissors. (Yeah, I was bored that evening)

Then I placed that into a full size Manila envelope and sent it certified mail so I'd have proof they received it this time.

They got it on Thursday.

My original check cleared on Friday.

Coincidence?

I think not.

I'll be interested to see if they cash the second one also...although I don't really care if they do, they deserve it, they'll spend that much in labor getting to it! ;-)
Click to expand...

I like you Tim, you’re a funny man! :D
 
Speed camera on 295 in DC - "Ambush" tax on commuters from MD and VA; pretty sure I wasn't speeding, but vehicles close together can "fool" the system.

Fortunately, it was my wife's car; I didn't pay, and eventually the calls started. I explained I wasn't going to pay it, and the guy lied, told me I wouldn't be able to renew my tags. I pointed out it wasn't a moving violation, the car is registered in MD, and there is no reciprocity for non-moving violations. If I don't bring the car onto DC again, no worries.

"It'll affect you credit" - not likely one unpaid ticket will matter much, and I can live with it.
 
Rushie said:
Thanks, this is the kind of feedback I'm looking for. I don't have much experience with toll roads but I'm not surprised at least one entity got it all screwed up.

I am assuming that the TxTag people, or ZipCash, or NTTA, whoever is billing and tracking this is completely separate from the DMV and that correcting the address with the DMV is not automatically going to make this go away. I intend to follow it up to the bitter end.
Click to expand...
https://www.thenewspaper.com/news/46/4681.asp

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...ing-lawsuit-that-alleged-predatory-practices/
 
Yes, TxTag is now a den of crooks and scammers. Their business model is to fine people and see how many are stupid to pay whatever they ask.

A) I'd get a big enough news station involved. This needs to be exposed.
B) If the vehicle in question is not yours, don't worry about it, they cannot impound it.
C) If someone breaks into your garage at night to steal ("impound") your vehicle, a .45 in their face should solve the problem. Make sure you report the attempted GTA to the police.
D) You can ask a friend lawyer to type up and mail a cease-and-desist letter with a warning that next time they will be charged with harassment.
 
When you let government sell off the roads you’re supposedly paying for out of taxes that never go down, to profit making companies, this is what you’re going to get.

Our toll profiteers here do similar stuff.

I also had three years of someone else’s tolls and photo radar tickets from multiple states being sent to my house until I wrote a detailed letter to the local Sheriff, the State Motor Vehicle Department, and the State Attorney General (since multiple crimes were involved by the people both on the road and in using our address to register their vehicles, and the State never confirmed they lived here).

I suggested they mark the plates as invalid and request the owners of the speeding RV traveling throughout the US on Colorado tags that they would need to renew their plates in person the next time, intelligible for online renewal, and bring proof of residency.

I suggested the Attorney General write to all of the other states with outstanding warrants and apologize that Colorado never validated the vehicle owners were residents, too.

Whatever they did, they got it stopped. A phone call from a DMV supervisor later indicated that at a minimum they flagged the plates as “must renew in person”. That was probably enough for the couple driving the RV (I had some nice photos of them) to pull their scam on some other address in another State.

But yeah, back to toll roads... and databases...

The problem there is once databas data gets messed up, most systems are not built to allow any front line staff to make corrections, nor to track when a staff member does make them, who did it. They literally can’t do it.

Our corporate billing for our company is crossed with another company across town in Comcast’s database. I even found a way to prove it to them on one of their own websites by entering our account ID number and a form auto-filling with the other company’s address. A direct link to the database rows and tables with the problem.

So far through multiple avenues and letters and e-mails with our account reps and sales and basically anyone we ever talk to about anything at Comcast, we can’t find a single individual who has rights to change this information in the database. It was corrupted by our initial fiber optic installation taking over a year, and I’m sure there was some database maintenance or an emergency restore done during that time frame where a DBA turned off referential constraints to force load the data back into a table, and a row was lost. And our database links were permanently and forever crossed with this other customer.

They literally can’t fix it.

As long as we get a paper bill and that company gets an electronic bill, everything is fine. The corrupted data break point is between the account and contact tables and the email addresses are stored in the contacts and the paper bill address is pulled from the account.

Every time we try to convert to email billing, the other company gets our bill. We know their billing lady by first name now. She’s very nice. I’ve talked to her multiple times.

So. Welcome to the world of database design and maintenance screw ups. Enjoy. There’s literally nothing anyone at the company who isn’t a database administrator can do about it, and anyone in customer service doesn’t even have a phone number for anyone like that.

In our Comcast contact link problem they will open a “billing ticket” and if the billing person tries to change the linked contacts on our account, the nice lady across town will get an email warning that someone changed her company’s billing contacts, she will call in and tell Comcast those people at my company don’t work there and change them back, and she will get our bill.

If you try to explain to a front line Comcast billing data entry person that you need to talk to someone who can look at their database itself for a record linking error they’ll put a supervisor on the phone who won’t understand the problem at all and will run out of excuses and nice things to say from their call center scripts and eventually hang up without any way to reach their database admins anyway.

Our account is truly effed until the day it’s cancelled. It will never be fixed.

Meanwhile...

Tim is my new hero. Bravo sir. LMAO.

timwinters said:
The timeliness of this thread is hilarious.

I was in the Dallas area in late March for a business meeting and used some toll roads.

I received an invoice in the mail from the North Texas Tollway Autority (NTTA) in late June, a full three months later. The total tolls, a whopping $3.81.

So I laughed at the inefficiency of the system and dropped a check in the mail to them using the provided envelope.

Fast forward to last week, and I get another invoice, this one marked "1st notice of non-payment." It was for $13.81...and included a $10 late charge. (Which is my understanding is illegal, I seem to recall that late charges can't be over 18% per annum, but I'm confident that govt entities have excluded themselves from this cap.)

Pffft. Really? I check my business account and, sure enough, the original check hadn't cleared yet.

So, I write another check, this one made out to something like "NTTA, stooopid f***ers." I put it in the provided return envelope and I completely seal it in two layers of clear packing tape then vacuum pack it.

Then I placed that envelope in a 1/2 size Manila envelope and wrote on the outside: "don't lose this one, dip$hits." And completely wrapped it in two layers of packing tape and vacuum packed it.

Oh, and I also put sheets of 29 ga sheet metal in both envelopes, cut to the exact size of each envelope, so they can't just cut them open with a scissors. (Yeah, I was bored that evening)

Then I placed that into a full size Manila envelope and sent it certified mail so I'd have proof they received it this time.

They got it on Thursday.

My original check cleared on Friday.

Coincidence?

I think not.

I'll be interested to see if they cash the second one also...although I don't really care if they do, they deserve it, they'll spend that much in labor getting to it! ;-)
Click to expand...
 
denverpilot said:
But yeah, back to toll roads... and databases...

The problem there is once databas data gets messed up, most systems are not built to allow any front line staff to make corrections, nor to track when a staff member does make them, who did it. They literally can’t do it.

...

Our account is truly effed until the day it’s cancelled. It will never be fixed.
Click to expand...

You just need a DBA POC who has access to that database! :) Sadly, my app and db that they use "over there" is not primary for billing/address info ...
 
timwinters said:
I'll be interested to see if they cash the second one also...although I don't really care if they do, they deserve it, they'll spend that much in labor getting to it! ;-)
Click to expand...

Downloading transactions this morning...yep, they cashed it...that didn't take long.
 
denverpilot said:
When you let government sell off the roads you’re supposedly paying for out of taxes that never go down, to profit making companies, this is what you’re going to get.
.
Click to expand...

When you let government sell off [airport access] you’re supposedly paying for out of taxes that never go down, to profit making companies, this is what you’re going to get.
 
timwinters said:
Downloading transactions this morning...yep, they cashed it...that didn't take long.
Click to expand...
Now they are betting you won't fight for a refund.

I've driven on the Denver E-470 a half-dozen times or so. One time I got away without a bill and once I *thought* I did. KS doesn't require front license plates, and the E-470 toll plazas rely on front and rear license plate photos. When we moved my daughter to college, I had a loaded bike rack on the back so the rear license plate was covered. I felt like letting those cameras take a nice picture of my middle finger, but decided not to. I did not get a bill for that one, we drive back a different route so I avoided the whole thing on the return leg. After graduation we moved her again, this time I had a UHaul trailer behind my car obstructing a camera view. I wondered if I'd get away with that one, too, but about 6 months later I got a bill. I got a bill for the drive out there in about 30 days, it was the return trip that took a while for them to track me down.
 
gkainz said:
You just need a DBA POC who has access to that database! :) Sadly, my app and db that they use "over there" is not primary for billing/address info ...
Click to expand...

Oh I know I know. To really get root cause they probably also need the transaction logs from four years ago, too... hahaha... but yeah, finding a way to a DBA at Comcast is downright impossible.

Especially when the entire customer front line thinks they can fix it by twiddling the data.

They don’t get it that I can SEE the cross linked data and watch it change when they do it. It took me multiple attempts to change the contact data over a year (would back burner it and work real problems and then come back to it every other month or so) until about the third time when I realized it was a bad row link, and then I set about proving it to them.

If they just forward my explanation email to a DBA with my phone number as backup, it’d be fixed in less than five minutes. They might even find an entire table that loaded up one row off.

I went through this once before with a company, similar problem, contact records messed up and I knew they’d done a dump and reload for a major upgrade. I was able to reach the DBA. When he said, “I don’t know how we’ll find out from the logs where that import skipped”, I pointed out that I have a nearly unheard of last name and it is damn near a hidden secondary key in his last name field... hahaha...

He laughed and said, that’s true... I can just follow your last name through the logs if no one in your family is in here... nope... you’re the only one, that helps! :)
 
denverpilot said:
...finding a way to a DBA at Comcast is downright impossible.
Click to expand...
True that. I know a couple DBAs as well as a couple SAs over there. However, the real trick is to figure out their super secret decoder that cross-references applications to departments to database names. Then and only then can you begin to chase down who works on what.

Edit - and if you can figure out why my post above (typed 3 times) auto-magically switched to small font about 40 characters in, you get a gold star!
 
My toll tag is on auto pay to my credit card. When it drops to $10 in the account it auto charges $40. I can track my tolls and DFW airport fees easily on the Tollmate app or the computer. NTTA customer service has been great when I've needed help, like when I forget my password or my CC number needs updating. To get onto an 80mph uncrowded tollway is like a dream come true, but I've lived in the land of crappy roads for most of my life. But we have lots more airplanes in Alaska as a result!
 
Over 40 years ago a computer programmer told me one thing about the upcoming computer age. 'To err is human but to really foul things up requires a computer.' We talked a lot about the social change it would cause she forecast the social media and news web sites and a lot more. It was a learning experience for me as almost all of what she forecast became true. One thing he did say was that it would make it more difficult to resolve problems because of the difficulty in getting to someone who could actually do something about it. I remember telling her that human nature being what it is the computer is gonna be so handy in shifting the blame to.
 
LOL. That dumb license plate thing would be dead in a week on my dirt roads and dead for anybody else here the day after a snowstorm where they cover everything in Magnesium Chloride. That crap sticks to everything like glue and instantly starts corrosion.

Those dumb little curtains would be coated in the stuff and would jam up nearly instantly.

And then there was the time the county tried to stabilize the dirt road WITH mag-chloride... that created mud that glued itself to everything in the nest rain. I actually took a vehicle to a tire place thinking I had a tire that was coming apart internally and delaminating after that one.

The tech comes out looking at me funny and says it’s fixed way too fast... then says all he needed was a sledgehammer and a chisel to get the mud blob off of the inside of the Subaru wheel... and wondered where I found “mud like that”.

Yeah, that curtain thing wouldn’t last two weeks.
 
Well here is the rest of the story. I think it's resolved.

Turns out the NTTA ZipCash statement had nothing to do with the current TxTag bill. Apparently they are two distinct entities. NTTA is just North Texas and it seems to be a private company. TxTag on the other hand is in the Texas DOT. They apparently issue tags for anywhere in the state but apparently only handle the billings for the Austin area.

Our trips to Dallas include two toll locations, one up in Dallas and another around Austin. So we get two different bills. And both entities had the wrong Rent-A-Center address.

The ZipCash payment I made cleared that one completely, but it just coincidentally was on the same date that TxTag "credited" the Austin toll due. It was not actually a credit or a payment; what they call a "credit" was them turning it over to collections.

Completely confusing. The bill made it seem like we only owed $3.45 but if I had just paid that, the rest of it would have remained outstanding and was already being marched through the penalty phases.

So I got TxTag on the phone and long story short they understood the wrong address situation and conceded this was not our fault, and removed all the fees, and said we only owed the original toll. Turns out "collections" is just another internal department, they didn't send it to an outside agency.

So I mailed them a check. I know I should do it in person and get a receipt but I am not driving up to Austin and that seems to be the only pay in person location. I sent a detailed letter with the check stating that per phone conversations on thus and such dates we understand this check absolves the debt completely, and I marked up copies of bills showing the WRONG address and the CORRECT address respectively in the appropriate colors of ink with sufficiently prolific explanation marks(!!!!!!).

Hubby and I even discussed wrapping it up in duck tape, shrink wrapping it in his food vacuum packer and enclosing hard metal sheets, in several nesting packages but decided not to go that far.

I hope this is the end of it.
 
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