National banks have been given the green light to collect highway tolls electronically.
In a ruling released last week, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency gave an unnamed bank permission to design, build, and operate a system of toll plazas.
The tollbooths would be equipped to receive signals from a vechicles. Fares would automatically be debited from the customers' accounts to one held by a group of public authorities, for which the bank would act as an agent.
The decision, contained in a July 1 interpretive letter, is part of the OCC's push to let national banks compete with nonbanks for new lines of business.
"This is a recognition that there are a wide range of electronic data processing, value transfer, and payment collection services that banks can legally provide," said Brian W. Smith, a partner with the Washington law firm of Mayer, Brown & Platt. "The OCC is sending the signal that banks are perfectly able to compete with a third-party processing company."
The bank is one of several bidders for a contract to set up the toll collection system for the public authority consortium. Although the contract has not been awarded yet, the bank requested confirmation from the OCC that the activity would be legal. If the bank wins the contract, the operation would be run through a new subsidiary.
The bank would set up a main "customer service center" to manage the toll collection network. The center also would open toll accounts, issue transponders, and accept payments from customers. In addition, the bank would have the option of issuing stored-value cards that drivers could be use instead of transponders.
The proposed collection and processing services are "clearly part of the business of banking," wrote Jonathan H. Rushdoony, counsel for the OCC's Northeastern district.
The approved activities would go beyond the electronic collection of road tolls, however. The bank, through a subcontractor, also would design and install the electronic receivers that communicate with the transponders in each customer's car.
