Emovis, part of Abertis Mobility Services, was recognized as the 2023 Private Sector Innovation award winner for its Smart Enforcement program by the International Bridge, Tunnel and Turnpike Association (IBTTA).

A common challenge for all tolling programs is collecting payments from unregistered users. This often leads to high management costs, revenue leakage and challenges to reputation. In response to this, emovis collaborated with Abertis’ Innovation Lab, a program that promotes projects aimed at finding solutions for smart roads and integrated mobility, for connected, autonomous and electric vehicles. Together, they launched a Smart Enforcement program in December 2020 that has since been introduced in Chile and the United Kingdom.

Smart Enforcement integrates with external third parties to track motorists’ new addresses. This increases accuracy and toll compliance and reduces the work and expense of undeliverable mail. In addition, the business intelligence team alongside the engineering department built predictive algorithms that optimizes actions for maximizing payment probabilities and cutting debt collection costs without affecting any revenues.

Smart Enforcement has generated solid results:

  • an increase in toll compliance to over 97% especially as previously untraceable customers are now located
  • a 19% reduction in recovery costs
  • a 33% reduction in customer disputes and 30% reduction in unregistered users not paying their tolls without any enforcement activity
  • a 25% improvement of the enforcement “cost to revenue ratio¨ meaning authorities obtained more monetary value for each dollar they spent in enforcement.

By incorporating automated machine learning, Smart Enforcement is able to ensure continuous adaptation to new user behaviours and data. Decision-making can be refined based on the results obtained through previous user behaviour and while considering recent user changes such as physical address, personal data and payment details.

“The innovation is impacting the financial side while dramatically improving perception and reputation,” said Christian Barrientos, CEO of Abertis Mobility Services. “Thanks to our colleagues’ efforts, we are able to predict payment behaviour, redesign the recovery process and provide customers with new communication channels.”

IBTTA’s Toll Excellence Awards recognize the very best projects and programs the international tolling industry has to offer. Winners whose creative, innovative and positive programs set a new standard of excellence are recognized during the IBTTA Annual Meeting and Exhibition. This year’s event takes place in Seattle and emovis was recognized at a session on October 9th.

 

About The International Bridge, Tunnel and Turnpike Association (IBTTA)

IBTTA is the worldwide association for the owners and operators of toll facilities and the businesses that serve them. Founded in 1932, IBTTA has members in more than 20 countries on six continents. Through advocacy, thought leadership and education, members are implementing state-of-the-art, innovative user-based transportation financing solutions to address the critical infrastructure challenges of the 21st century. For more information, visit www.ibtta.org.