The Land Transport Authority will now use a texting platform to send reminders of payments and important dates to its customers.

Yesterday the LTA and Vodafone Fiji signed a partnership agreement for the launching of this texting platform with the aim to better its communication with its stakeholders, particularly its customers. The signing of the partnership was held at the LTA headquarters in Nasinu.

LTA board chairperson Vijay Maharaj said previously, when the red light or speed cameras captured an offence, the vehicle owner would be sent a letter via post and often the customers would miss deadlines by the time they receive it.

“With this new system in place, drivers or offenders will have no excuse that they were not notified,” he said.

“If a driver or vehicle owner has been captured by one of our red light/ speed cameras, the respective person will receive a text message immediately to notify them to visit the nearest LTA office to clear the fines.”

Mr Maharaj said the service was not only limited to drivers captured on the cameras, but it would be for all Traffic Infringement Notices issued manually by enforcement/Police officers.

“We will be working to ensure drivers and vehicle owners are notified in a timely manner.”

He urges all driver license holders to visit their nearest LTA office and update their contact details so that notifications would reach them as soon as possible.

Acting chief executive officer Ronald Prasad said the new platform would be very simple and effective to use in terms of reaching its targeted audiences.

“We have many businesses that use this facility for various purposes, such as sending reminders, notices, marketing and information services and products,” he said.

“Apart from compliance with provisions of the regulations, this will also help with the collections.

“There are so many times when people forget to make payments and when they are reminded, the rate of collection is much better.”

Mr Prasad added that the entire process had been made easier by using this simple technology.

“The customer receives a notification via SMS to pay, he/she uses the M-Paisa option to pay and gets an electronic receipt. LTA updates the payment in the system, settlements are done and case closed.

“This means less people in LTA offices, convenience for the customer and better collections. A win-win for all the parties.”

The SMS platform will be activated latest by next week.

Edited by Jonathan Bryce

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