Most will know that the french motorways/autoroutes have a plethora of peage toll booths to collect fees for use of those "A" roads - fair enough, that is one of their ways of funding their road construction and maintenance.
Now, those booths are increasingly switching over to un-manned, automated methods of collecting the tolls.
The payment can be made by means of an automated system whereby each vehicle drives slowly through the peage station and the fee is collected automatically, or via what appear to be pre-paid cards to be entered into the machines BUT the average foreign visitor will not have these two choices to hand.
Historically, I have paid cash but this option is rapidly disappearing as the un-manning of the booths continues which leaves me with just a debit/credit card to use in the machines; the downside of this is the bank charges back at home - you can pay what amounts to a very small fee to use a short section of autoroute and end up with fixed charges by your bank that raise that fee by well over 100%.
If travelling longer distances on the A roads, the charges still accumulate on your home bank account because use of each and every toll booth incurs another standing charge for foreign exchange services.

Somewhere in another thread is discussion of the pros and cons of using pre-paid foreign exchange (forex) cards whereby you can buy what amounts to credit that is placed on a card; does anyone know if these will work in the french toll machines?

__________________
Dave

I have been all over Europe and so far I've not found one that don't take cash. Any way I have one of these pre paid card's. Mine is Fairfx, can find them on face book. Dead easy to use. And the exchange rate is dam good. New people get £5 paid in-to their account on there first card load. I usually put a £1,000 on mine. Use it when I have to. Another thing I use is one of them snap open purses. You know the thing, a bag with a couple of spring clip's to open it. Load that up with a 10 euro note and some change. Slip that in the map holder. Come to pay. You can get the purse out with your gloves on, pass it over and the lady usually knows what to do. Ask her to put the ticket in side. That way you can work out how much you have paid on tolls.
Hope that helps
John933

__________________
To buy petrol in Europe. Pull up at station. Wait. Get out a 20 Euro note, then ask someone to fill up the bike. Give person money. Ride away. Simple.

If you're on a bike, you should go through the manned ones wherever possible - I'm pretty sure if you go through the automated ones you just get charged at the car rate rather than the lower bike rate.

Moto's are Class 5. If the automated booth does not recognise you as such, press the help button and tell them you are a moto. Can create quite a tailback at peak times

For info: Prix des péages en France - WikiSara

John

__________________
Nostradamus Ate My Hamster

I have managed to avoid peage on the bike for the past 20 years but use them a lot in the car. More often than not there is no manned booth and only occassionally have I seen one of those baskets for throwing coins into. I'm always conscious of causing a delay but then I always seem to be the one in the credit card channel who gets behind the car whose card doesn't work.

If you are in a high top van you also need to be careful that you don't get charged the commercial vehicle rate at automatic booths. Like John says push the help button - they always speak English in my experience.

Ah! That is more or less what I was trying to describe in a long-winded kind of way!
I was last over there about 2 weeks ago and I don't recall seeing a single cash basket between Calais and Toulouse.
At one of those unmanned toll booth machines I may have even paid as a truck because the bottom set of slots were not taking my debit card, so I reached up on high and used the top set of slots for ticket/debit card/receipt.
Anyway, my main point/question remains unanswered - will those prepaid cards issued in the UK, such as Fairfx etc, work OK in the French peage booths?

__________________
Dave

true - but if you happen to be 2 x bikes (or 3x) you can all sneak through on the one payment if you are feeling naughty.

I've seen it done, clearly - I would personally never condone the behaviour

In Italy near Milan I once 'inadvertently' followed a car through the booth, never heard anything from it.

I've done that as well. Same zip. happed.
John933

__________________
To buy petrol in Europe. Pull up at station. Wait. Get out a 20 Euro note, then ask someone to fill up the bike. Give person money. Ride away. Simple.

Does that card work OK in the non-manned toll booths on the autoroutes?

__________________
Dave

I have no idea. As I use cash if and when I use the toll's. But the up side is you get a good rate of exchange for your money. Payment on toll road's I use a small purse with a small amount of cash. Just hand that over. The lady will take the money and put the ticket inside. Keep the purse in the map holder on the tank. That way you can get it out with your glove's on. No flapping around.
John933

__________________
To buy petrol in Europe. Pull up at station. Wait. Get out a 20 Euro note, then ask someone to fill up the bike. Give person money. Ride away. Simple.

Hi John:

That sounds like a really clever idea, a lot quicker than digging out a credit card, and without the risk of losing the credit card (dropping it on the ground) somewhere along the way.

Thanks for sharing that suggestion.

Michael

credit cards would be a horrendously expensive way to pay I would think. Most will charge you a transaction fee and have crap exchange rates.

I have just this week received a free (i.e. no fee) VISA debit card from comdirect bank, which allows me to retrieve money from every cash machine sporting a VISA logo without any charge (as in NO CHARGE), which will be debited directly from my free (i.e. no fee) comdirect account. I have to test it with a toll booth, though. If at all, I´ll end up with a 1,5% surcharge (not if charged in Euros, though), which is far away from 100%.... I´m eternally grateful to the person pointing this option out to me.

Regards
Chris

__________________
Need to fix your Africa Twin? Check out my step-by-step frame strip pictures at
Google+ album: http://tinyurl.com/6u93yv2
Dropbox with zip-File: http://tinyurl.com/czj8qgw

Hi Dave:

I think that the easiest fix for your problem is for you to obtain another (i.e. a different) credit card.

I have two Canadian credit cards, one MasterCard, the other American Express, and I have used both of them on the French Autoroutes in years past. Both card companies mark up the foreign exchange transaction by 2%, but heck, that is negligible for road tolls. That's about $2 per $100, and I can't possibly imagine spending more than $100 a year on French Road Tolls (unless I reach pensionable age and go buy a Gold Wing...)

Different credit cards have different advantages and disadvantages. It might be that the card you have used in the past has lots of domestic advantages for you (airline points, or cash back, or some other angle like that), but has very disadvantageous foreign exchange practices. Just search around until you find a card that has very desirable FX practices, then, sign up for it. Most of the 'basic' (i.e. not 'premium') credit cards are free of annual charges.

In my opinion, using a credit card on the French Motorways is even more convenient than having a transponder (electronic pass) - you don't have all the worries about setting up the transponder, paying the bill, that kind of stuff. Just shove the credit card in the slot, wait 5 seconds, retrieve it, and ride on.

Michael