Starting from June 30, drivers who lack a stamp that proves they have paid the road maintenance fee, will be fined VND3-6 million (USD144-288).
 |
Nguyen Xuan Cuong, Deputy Head of the Directorate for Road of Vietnam announced the news.
Nguyen Van Thanh, Deputy Head of Vietnam Automobile Transport Association said the first suggestion for road maintenance fee collection was to collect the money via fuel prices. But it was turned down for being impractical.
If the suggestion were applied, people who rarely use their vehicle wouldn't have to paid much. However, other vehicles that don't travel on roads such as airplane, ships or industrial equipment would also have to pay the fee.
Even though the road maintenance fee went into effect since January 1, there are still many issues exist.
Firms said that in these difficult economic times, they had many vehicles left unused if they still had to pay the fee on them it would be an additional burden.
The government decided to remove 17 road toll stations to avoid overlapping fee, but that was just a third of the total in operation.
Thanh suggested exempting buses from the fee since buses travel mostly inside urban areas. If buses had to pay maintenance fee, their ticket price would go up.
He said trailers and semi-trailers should also be exempted because they need tractors to be able to travel on road.
Paying for the semi-trailers would put enterprises in more difficulties.
Currently, Vietnam has about 35 million motorbikes and 1.5 million cars. The government may collect VND6 trillion per year from road maintenance fee.
