"With an e-Toll Card transactions only take three seconds."
Jakarta (ANTARA News) - State Enterprises Minister Dahlan Iskan made a surprise visit on Monday when he appeared at the Cililitan toll gate in East Jakarta to sell e-Toll Cards.

Earlier, the minister surprised drivers by forcibly opening a toll gate to reduce a car queue and angrily threw away the absent gate officers` seats. He said their absence caused motorists, including the minister, to wait a long time to pass through the gate.

"Buy e-Toll Card, sir, just for Rp50,000 and if you are lucky you may win a Blackberry, iPad or Galaxy Tab," he told passing motorists.

Also, several artists, including Dik Doank, Sandra Dewi, Happy Salma and Atika Sari Devi, helped the minister sell the cards.

Dahlan said he hopes sales at toll gates would proceed faster if more drivers would use e-Toll Cards and usually long queues at toll gates could be cut. "With an e-Toll Card transactions only take three seconds," he added.

Also, state-owned Mandiri Bank, as the manager of e-Toll services, began offering a three month discount of 10 percent to e-Toll Card buyers as of Monday.

"Yes, we directly offered the cards to toll road users with a 10 percent discount. It applies on Monday to Friday for three months to motivate people to use the automatic toll gate," he said.

He said using the cards toll payment service is faster and reduces queues at toll gates.

"Until March 2012 the total cards that have been produced has reached more than 693,000, up 239 percent from the same period last year. Transactions, meanwhile, reach 4.8 millions a month, up 300 percent from 1.2 million in March 2011," he said.

Out of all Mandiri pre-paid cards, such as the e-Toll Card, Indomart Card and Gaz Card, reaching more than 1.58 millions sold, the use of the e-Toll Card was dominant, reaching 94 percent of total transactions.

The e-Toll Card is now applicable in 520 gates for 12 toll road sections in various regions and can be re-filled in more than 20,000 locations in many big cities such as Jakarta, Bandung, Surabaya, Yogyakarta, Semarang, Medan, Lampung and Bali and in Mandiri ATM networks with a "refill" sign.
(Uu.H-YH/INE/KR-BSR/O001)

Editor: Priyambodo RH
Copyright © ANTARA 2012