Despite the extended deadlines for Dart Charge payments, customers are still facing a range of issues, with threats of fines being issued for late, non-payments or unvalidated cards.

The extended payment period for drivers without an account ended on August 15 for crossings made between July 27 and August 14.

The next deadline for account holders is August 31, which is the deadline to revalidate cards to enable automatic payments.

Customers continue to report a variety of problems with their accounts on Twitter and are struggling to get support from customer service.

Some users have experienced difficulties re-validating their cards, while others found that their account balances were reset, journeys were not recorded, and local resident permits were removed.

These ongoing issues with the Dart Charge system have caused frustration and inconvenience for drivers.

Oliver Wilkinson tweeted: “I updated my payment method this morning following the recent debacle.

“This afternoon, you tried to take payment from the old method, which was a still entirely valid and working card, but failed for some reason. Please, please, get a grip of your systems.”

Robert Clark added: “Now I can't even login to the Dart Charge website.

“It says "you are already logged in" so I go to my "home page" it says you are not logged in so I click login it says you are logged in.

“I'm stuck in an endless loop. Must be one of the worst public IT sector upgrades in memory.”

@samihighbury on Twitter has been unable to pay their fee: “I am a non-account holder who could only pay for one crossing as your website didn’t show the option to pay for two crossings.

"Payment option for crossing no. Two didn’t come up until the following day, which was two days after I made the crossing!!”

Kim Edwards shared her own experience: “I'm up to day 14 of continuously trying to pay for my LRDS.

"I've loaded my evidence, emailed you my evidence but I get the blue circle of death when I try to pay online, every day for 14 days.”

 

Claire C said: “My account has been suspended, even though I updated my payment details.

“I have tried entering various card details, but none of them can be added.

“My account also appears to have been wiped apart from my email address and car.

"I don’t want to receive a fine!”

Account holders have until August 31 to validate their cards to enable automatic payments.

The payment deadlines were temporarily extended due to service disruptions caused by the Dart Charge website being offline.

From July 28 to July 30, customers were unable to access the website, and even after it came back online, problems persisted due to high levels of traffic.

This led to long queues and delays in paying tolls.

A National Highways spokesperson said: "We recently announced updates to the Dart Charge service.

"Whilst the new service is now live, we recognise that there have been some unforeseen issues that have affected the level of service provided.

"We sincerely apologise for any disruptions customers may have encountered and want customers to be assured that they are committed to addressing these issues as quickly as possible. 

"From August 16 recent crossings will begin to appear on accounts and auto payments will begin to be taken but this may take some time as the system catches up.

"We would like to reassure customers that we have captured crossing information and your account will be fully up to date by 31 August 2023.

"We would like to remind their account holders who have not done so yet, to re-validate their payment card information to ensure uninterrupted access to the Dart Charge service.

"The easiest way to do this is to log into your account online."

                              

For any crossings made between 27 July and 14 August but not paid for, there will be a final opportunity to pay at the Road User Crossing rate for a period of 14 days. This will be explained in a letter to the registered keeper, attached to the PCN, where they will offer an opportunity to only pay the standard road user charge. The aim is to provide a fair and reasonable resolution for any inadvertent delays that might occur during this transition phase.