Toll system in Florida (tolls, Sunpass, …) How does it work?

In Florida, there are many paying roads. The problem for tourists like us (misinformed) is that there are four payment systems in parallel:

• The Toll by plate: automatic system where your license plate is flashed and the toll amount is charged to you.
• The Sunpass, an automatic system via a physical transponder present in the car that has been credited beforehand.
• Teller machines with an employee where you can pay (in cash only, the employee gives change).
• Exact Coins Only ATMs, where you have to pay in coins and top up the change.

Where it gets complicated is that while the first two systems are systematically present (Toll by plate and Sunpass), this isn’t the case for the other two.

When you arrive at a toll zone, you will see large signs that tell you which line to take according to the system you want to use, so be careful.

We discovered this… on the road. Between Miami and the Keys where there’s no ATM to pay cash. Slight increase of stress when seeing the flashes… each infraction is charged 25 dollars fine + the amount of the toll. At the rate of 4 or 5 tolls per day sometimes, it can go up quickly!

If you ask around, you will find that most car rental companies have their cars registered with the authorities. As a result, they are eligible for Toll by plate. The car rental company will charge you for the costs afterwards.

At Hertz, this system is called the Platepass.

In principle it’s pretty cool but :

• Already they could have prevented, it would have saved us stress. It’s already not easy to tame driving in a new country, I would have liked to avoid asking myself questions about the toll system.
• Nothing is free. At Hertz, they will charge you $5.95 per day of Platepass use. So you can potentially drive one day through a single 50-cent toll, whatever, they’ll add $5.95 to your fee. Over a stay of several weeks, that can make a small budget at the end. Previously, the total amount of the fees was capped. This is no longer the case. These fees vary according to the rental companies, so be informed, it may encourage you to choose one rather than the other.

It may be possible to buy a Sunpass and credit it to avoid using the renter’s system but in this case, remember to warn them in advance to avoid paying twice .

Once we understood this system, we did what was necessary to have a small reserve of bills and coins in the car and it became a game: avoid Toll by plate as much as possible. When there were no alternatives, too bad, we were entitled to the 5.95 dollar fee.

We had a raging day where we passed 3 or 4 tolls paying cash at the ticket office before falling on an exact corner where we were only 25 cents short. So we had to pass on the Toll by plate line 🙁

About 15 days after the end of our rental, I received the following email from Hertz who directly debited the amount from my card.

We’re doing not too badly in the end, having used the Plate Pass for only 3 days out of a 2-week stay. It was unavoidable the first two times (100% automatic toll) and avoidable the 3rd time (we were missing 25 cents). I was expecting to pay more even if it’s a bit annoying to have to pay 17 dollars in fees for 4 dollars of toll.

EDIT: about ten days later, I received a new email from Hertz and a new $5.06 withdrawal. I hope it will stop there.

If you’re not in too much of a hurry, you can also ask the Google Maps or Waze applications to suggest routes avoiding tolls.

Did you like this article? Check out our itinerary : 14 days Road Trip in Florida here