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Motorway travel cards


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Help! Does anyone know how to access motorway travel cards for the tolls? I have been told that you can buy a card which enables you to save roughly 20% on toll fees on the motorways. I have a holiday house in France and travel there about 6 times per year so could be a significant saving for me. I have trawled the net but although there are some sites the ones in English are not very helpful and my limited French does not allow me tounderstand the French ones. The house is in Fresselines in the Limousin so we use motorways for most of journeys. Any advice would be appreciated. thanks.
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[quote user="marilyn"]I have been told that you can buy a card which enables you to save roughly 20% on toll fees on the motorways. [/quote]

Misinformed, I'm afraid.

You can indeed buy a Telepeage card, but (unless there's some special deal going on at the moment), it's at the going rate and simply enables you to pass through the dedicated lanes and your windscreen device 'pings'.  Subsequent d/d bill.

You pay €20 - €30 p.a. for the priviledge: well worth it, whether you live here year-round, or are just holidaying in the Summer when the peages are chockahh.

Someone else will have the link to enable purchase. 

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Seems that there are at least a couple of discount schemes, one is aimed at commercial traffic and another applies to vehicles adapted for transport of the disabled but as far as the public at large are concerned then no, nothing.

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[quote user="Gardian"]You can indeed buy a Telepeage card, but (unless there's some special deal going on at the moment), it's at the going rate and simply enables you to pass through the dedicated lanes and your windscreen device 'pings'.  Subsequent d/d bill.

You pay €20 - €30 p.a. for the priviledge: well worth it, whether you live here year-round, or are just holidaying in the Summer when the peages are chockahh.[/quote]

Or if you sign up for the ALIS telepeage badge, you do not pay any annual charge or setup fee, as has been frequently mentioned on this forum (let's put it this way, we got ours after reading about it here)

http://www.offres-alis.com/fr/confort.php

This one does give you a discount, but ONLY on a section of the Alençon-Rouen autoroute. The badge works on all French autoroutes.

The badge is known on this forum and elsewhere as a "doofer". If you do a search on "doofer", you'll find the previous discussions.

Regards

Pickles

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As Pickles has said, the discount with the ALIS card applies only to a nominated section of the A28 but the free device works just the same on other autoroutes.

I never use the A28 but still have the ALIS deal as the absence of upfront and monthly charges more than outweighs the benefit I would get from discounts offered by operators of the roads I use. And so far, the ALIS package has worked very smoothly. Can't fault it.

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A colleague came back from France with a doofer. Apparently, Lyon is a notorious toll point and you can wait in excess of an hour to get through. She drove past a huge queue, straight up to the Telepeage lane and straight through.

Yes, go for the Alis doofer - no additional cost which all the others seem to have. Also they do not require a deposit which others do.

With one, no waking up the passenger (if in a RHD car), taking the ticket and then at the end of the section, waking up the passenger,finding the money, queueing and then finally paying.

With Alis you do require a French bank account and payments are by direct debit the month following travel. You can email or fax the forms and you will receive a doofer in less than a week.

But hey, we should not be advertising this. If everyone gets one there will be queues for the Telepeage lane and none at the pay booths [:D]

Paul

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[quote user="lacote0_0"]I get 25% discount with my AREA telepeage badge, but only on AREA's autoroutes, the rest of France is full price.
[/quote] 

 

Same applies with APRR but only one trip in 6 free on a nominated section of their network - so there are deals out there.

 

I think APRR and AREA are linked somehow.

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I have never seen the need for a transponder but that is because I have never yet had to queue at a péage, I did have a dart-tag for the Dartford tunnel before they built the bridge.

The lack of traffic jams was something that I had slowly taken for granted and hence another reason for coming here had become forgotten, I recently went to the Paris air show and whilst leaving Le Bourget to get back on the autoroute I was shocked to see that my diesel consumption was displayed as 9 MPG, I thought that I had a leak as usually I get 55-65 and even after only 200m from a cold start it is 24mpg.

Of course I had spent about 30 minutes to crawl the 2 miles showing on the trip meter, it then dawned on me that something which used to be an almost daily routine on the M25 and other roads in the S.E. of England had happened for the first time only in 4 and a half years in France.

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  • 2 weeks later...
I don't - they are all around me! :D

But as a solo traveller (not counting the cat) I do love my Sanef doofer as it means I don't have to keep getting out and running round the car to pick up a ticket or pay at tolls.
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Even if there are no queues you still have to stop, at one end take the card or at the other end hand over the card and pay or insert the card and you bank card and then drive off.

With the doofer, slow in the lane and then drive off when the barrier rises. The money will be collected from your bank account the month following.

I see it as a no-contest. I have been surprised at how much difference it really does make, far more than I thought it would.

Paul

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  • 2 months later...
Pickles and/or anyone else...

Thanks for the link and I have printed the Alis application form...

My French is reasonable and I am sure I will fill it in OK, but...

From looking at it, I assume it can only be used with my French bank account and not (as I would prefer) with my UK bank account?

Thanks in advance for any help on this!
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[quote user="Mel"]Pickles and/or anyone else...

[/quote]

Thank the "anyone elses" - as an infrequent autoroute user, I got mine after attention was drawn to the Alis offer by other members of this board including DerekJ.

[quote user="Mel"]Thanks for the link and I have printed the Alis application form...

My French is reasonable and I am sure I will fill it in OK, but...

From looking at it, I assume it can only be used with my French bank account and not (as I would prefer) with my UK bank account?

Thanks in advance for any help on this![/quote]

The Alis one can only be used with a French bank account. From postings by the-artist-currently-known-as-An0ther and others, IIRC the Sanef one can be paid via a UK credit card.

Regards

Pickles

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