Peage doofer

A snowHead

Dear all,

Planning our drive down to Val D’Isère Feb 2023. Like many others we’ve not been skiing since Feb 2020. We usually drive and use an APRR doofer. I got it back in 2017 so thinking the battery might be gone by the time we need it. Before I attempt to get another, are the APRR doofers worth getting or are there cheaper ones available?

Thanks for your help.

A snowHead

@Page23, it's quite easy to order another one through your APPR account, then return the old one. Now you actually have it, I don't think there is a cheaper alternative. May not be worth the hassle to change.

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

APRR doofer is now Mango doofer. The deal is still the same but now requires bank account iban rather than being able to link to credit card. The english website also works better as well.

https://www.mango-mobilitesbyaprr.com/en

And you can also now have it work in Spain, Portugal and Italy in addition to France if you want.

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@Hells Bells,

Thanks.

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

@adithorp,

Thanks, that’s helpful

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I'm planning to get one ... I have a euro bank account and debit card but no credit card. Should I be looking at this one or are there others?

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After all it is free

I had/have an aprr doofer. Because of the pandemic I didn't use it in a while and my card had expired so they'd closed the account.

But they sent the forms to set up again, send a new doofer and all was OK in the end.

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Thanks for all the replies and help. Regarding the Mango one, am I correct in understanding that one pays a charge for the month only when you are in a country of use (in addition to the incurred peage tariff)? Are there any hidden costs?

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Check the small print...ours is with bip&go and they charge a fee if it's not used at least once in the year. We didn't relise until the pandemic and we couldn't go anywhere! I know other providers don't make the same charge though.

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How to check your tag status and a list of providers plus related issues (like sun strips blocking the signal, issues with setting up payments to some providers etc.) were discussed in the thread on tag advice.

@LaForet, thanks thats helpful.

Idiot question...which lane is the 30kph lane....the one with the green arrow or the one with a T ?

You know it makes sense.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

I have had problems with Mango...if you have no French bank account your UK one has to accept SEPA payments and not all of them do ( two of mine dont ) I am in the process of testing this out with my credit cards IBAN number which they need to check out Puzzled

A snowHead

A snowHead

My Santander account wouldnt work on IBAN for mango
Fortunately Revolut does!

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

I got a Mango tag back at the start of the year and didn't have any issues setting up the Direct Debit with a UK/£ NatWest bank account.

@Page23, correct. You get a €1.70 charge added to your bill but ONLY in months you actually use the tag. For the standard Feb. half term trip that means just a single €1.70 charge. Drive down for New Years and you're looking at €3.40 (€1.70 on the Dec. bill for the drive out and another €1.70 on the Jan. one for the drive back).

@holidayloverxx, I think almost everywhere you can use the tag in any lane, but only use the tag in the "t" lanes. Not all "t" labes are "30kph" ones though and the ones that are have a big "30" sign next to the "t" one. Generally "t" lanes will be on the left side/cash ones on the right.

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Here's the toll southbound on the Autoroute des Anglais at Setques, with one lane designated both [T] and (30). On bigger tolls, there's usually a (30) on the left for cars and often on the right for lorries and you can use either. And on larger tolls, other lanes may be designated [T] as well.

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@50.7193537,2.1720625,3a,75y,132.81h,75.7t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sp-OugavB88nzwccmtaDVfA!2e0!7i16384!8i8192

(Because the forum's platform software has a bug in it re URLs, you'll have to copy and paste the whole string. It can't cope with a '!' in the string for some reason. Ditto the link below for the northbound view.)

In terms of thought process, as I approach, scanning from left to right, I first look for a [T] and then a (30). Going through a [T] is only marginally slower than a (30). What you don't want to do is get confused by all the other icons like credit card etc. and end up joining a cash/card-only queue. Re the photo above, be aware they might change the lane designations from the day this was shot.

Here's the other side of the toll station, northbound, which is much more complicated with ten lanes - the sort of thing that can be daunting if you're not prepared:

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/@50.7190033,2.1731918,3a,75y,328.57h,92.57t/data=!3m6!1e1!3m4!1sREeOuUThFkUyp-vqzZYlNw!2e0!7i16384!8i8192

You can see there is the usual height-restricted (30)[T] on the far left and another high-vehicle (30)[T] four along, plus a standard [T] fourth from the right and one that's closed. A further complication is that the right three lanes take you off on another route. And this one has one lane that takes coins and the rest take only cards. This is the last one northbound before you get to Calais, so it's a good idea to be prepared and keep to the centre/left as you approach. Overall, just be aware they can change the lane designations at will, so you can't be 100% sure how any station will be laid out.

I find that as well as Cayennes, it's often a Bently or Range Rover that tailgates me as I keep left on the approach to the tolls and then lurches across the carriageway when they realise I'm entering a (30)[T] and they don't have a tag. Then blasts past me a bit later up the autoroute to catch up. Which isn't a good idea on this final section of the AdA because the Gendarmerie are particularly hot around UKs speeding there. And why someone spends that much on a luxury car and doesn't get a tag is beyond me.

Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

Thanks again to everyone. Bloody love my fellow snowheads.

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After all it is free

Good point - if you have an SUV+roofbox or bicycles on the roof then there's the extra complication of height-restricted lanes. If you have either, then don't get so fixated on identifying a [T] that you miss the height barrier and your bicycles are ripped off. Something which I've seen with a GB at a toll station further south.

For the last five years we've used an Auto Tunnel Mont Blanc tag - ATMB- without issue and its a very easy system and the offers across providers are about the same. If they weren't the issuer would lose business.

The payment comes from our french bank account making life easy and their site is easy to navigate to get invoices etc

When approaching the tag lanes, I tend to leave a decent gap behind the vehicle in front as you do get non tag cars coming in as they see the easy flow traffic.

I've used it on my motorbike in the summer months but have used the right hand truck lanes and kept away from other vehicles so that the toll recognises that I'm on a bike and not a car or truck.

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It seems they dont like credit cards but here is the reply
Monsieur,

Vous nous questionnez concernant la souscription au télépéage MANGO et nous vous en remercions.

Nos contrats sont soumis au prélèvement automatique SEPA par IBAN.

Le débit sur carte bancaire n’est pas proposé. Nous regrettons de ne pouvoir accéder à votre demande.

Vous pouvez choisir d’enregistrer un compte bancaire domicilié à l’étranger, à condition qu’il permette les prélèvements à la norme européenne SEPA. Pour le savoir, testez votre numéro d’IBAN en cliquant ICI.

Il convient donc au préalable de vous renseigner auprès de votre établissement bancaire pour savoir si la banque permet les prélèvements à la norme SEPA Européenne et de leur fournir le mandat en pièce jointe.

En revanche, si celui-ci n’est pas éligible à la norme SEPA, nous ne pourrons pas vous fournir de badge.

Nous vous présentons nos excuses pour la gêne occasionnée.

Un grand merci pour votre fidélité et bonne route avec Mango mobilités by APRR

here is the link for you tocheck whether your account will work

https://www.ibancalculator.com/iban_validieren.html

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I would say, don't use the 30k lane the first time you use a new doofer just in case it doesn't work (me and @pigeondave, have had a faulty new ones). Even with an old one, the first gate of a trip seems to me to take a bit longer kmight just be doofer anxiety) so I go a normal lane first time.

Also remember it's 30kph max so at 20 the barrier will go up in plenty of time. At 29kph it's a nail biter. I think there's been an upgrade to a lot of the sensors though and response times seemed much quicker this summer.

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I think they stopped allowing french CC's a while ago due to a change in French law. SANEF opened an office in Harrogate to get around it for UK customers but APRR carried on allowing UK customers to use CC. When my old account got cancelled I hot 2 reasons. One that the card had expired and the other that CC linked accounts weren't allowed (but that was via Google translate so could be wrong).

Looking like we might be driving over at Christmas this season, and quite possibly in April as well, so will definitely get myself one of these, saves the GF the hassle each time we get to toll booth, for the sake of €1.70 a trip it's worthwhile in my eyes. Especially as chances are i'll be driving home on my own in April.

You know it makes sense.

On Spain...

I replaced my previous one with Mango, 'cos it does France and Spain. France- great. Spain - no tolls! Well I'm sure there are, but not in the 450 miles Perpignan to Murcia two days back! Bitchin' Betty warned me about all of the tolls as they approached, but every single one was non-existent! There was evidence that the plazas were under construction though. I'll take the win and set it against the fuel cost.

France: cheapest was 1.34/l; Spain: cheapest so far, 1.76/l.

Otherwise you'll just go on seeing the one name:

Absolutely love this and amazing tip from snowheads!
My Mango works with a basic/free revolut account.
It’s mentioned above but it took us a few trips to work out we could use a green arrow lane with the tag too. We would always look for the T specific one and sometimes, not often, they are all height restricted (disco/roof box combo here too).

A snowHead

@Charliegolf, Spain have removed lots of tolls, certainly large chunks of AP7 /E15 are now toll-free. my Mum lives between Alicante and Valencia so we now don't have to pay motorway tolls between hers and airports. Happened during lockdowns iirc.

A snowHead

We use Emovis tag (SANEF) because it was so much easier to setup, all in in English with direct debit on UK bank account. Costs are similar.

Well, the person's real but it's just a made up name, see?

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Anyway, snowHeads is much more fun if you do.

Just for ease of reference, here are the links to some of the providers

● Emovis (Liber-t as was)
● Bip&Go
● Mango Mobilités
● Ulys-Vinci
● Eurotunnel (Emovis partner offer*)

*Free application - no fee (save €10) €8 annual fee for the first year of subscription, discounted to €4 from the second year onwards. Requires a Eurotunnel booking reference.

You'll need to Register first of course.

@LaForet, now that's handy, I have a booking ref for the next trip

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We use Bip & Go and have done for the last 20 odd years (It too used to be called Sanef). When they wrote to us to say they were withdrawing payment by credit card we set up a direct debit with our Starling Bank Euro current account and that works fine.

We prefer it simply because there are no fees whatsoever apart from €1.70 in the month that it is used and they are the only provider with offices all over the north of France. This means that if the thing is faulty or getting old (I think they will change it after 5 years) we just pop into an office as we pass and get it changed or sorted. Saves messing around with postage and correspondence. It took 5 minutes to change our old one at the office by the motorway at StOmer in June just passed

There is a €10 fee if it is not used in 12 consecutive months which we only found out about recently because of lockdown but that was the first time since we’ve had it so no big deal.

Website is very good now (didn’t used to be) and is in English if you need it

After all it is free

I have the Emovis too for the same reasons as @Timc, - it was easiest to set up 5 years ago with UK bank account. Service from them has been really good changed the tag once in that time and not worth changing now I have it. I really wouldn't be without it, worth every penny for the ease of use.

Although like @adithorp, says, i never go through the 30kmh lane on the first toll of any trip, just in case!

Help!!

Peage doofer

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