Breakthrough for car rental firms

Pretoria - Members of the Southern African Vehicle Rental and Leasing Association (Savrala) now have access to eNaTIS, the national road traffic information system, to simplify the processing of traffic fines and make it more effective.

This follows an agreement with the Road Traffic Management Corporation (RTMC) and its little brother, the Road Traffic Infringement Agency (RTIA).

According to Savrala general manager Val van den Bergh, about 400 000 traffic fines are issued each year to Savrala members. About 150 000 of these are issued to foreigners renting cars.

All these fines, which amount to at least R60m a year, have to be reissued to the drivers of the vehicles.

This involves a cumbersome process in which the fines are first sent by registered post to the Savrala members. These companies then have to send details of the drivers back to the RTMC per registered post within a specific period before the fines can be reissued.

In future, Savrala members will be alerted electronically if a traffic offence has been committed with one of their vehicles.

They will then have a limited period to enter the details of the driver concerned directly into eNaTIS, so that the fine can be reissued.

Savrala members will also be able to check on the eNaTIS system whether prospective drivers have valid driving licences before they rent a car.

This will be necessary once the demerit point system attached to the Administrative Adjudication of Road Traffic Offences Act (Aarto) comes into force countrywide in November.

Whereas a leasing agent could previously accept a driving licence at face value, it will now have to establish whether the particular licence has not meanwhile been suspended because of demerit points.

- Sake24.com

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