PWC advocates digital approach to road tolls collection

Audit  firm PricewaterhouseCoopers (PWC), in its 2024 mid-year budget digest, is recommending the adoption of a digital approach for reintroducing road and bridge tolls.

It explained that leveraging digital technologies, as seen in other revenue collection sectors, could significantly reduce revenue leakage and corruption.

PWC proposed that government should implement a system wherein drivers use prepaid swipe cards linked to their Ghana Card, the national identity card.

“Our recommendation is that government goes digital as they have done in other aspects of revenue collection. We believe providing drivers with prepaid swipe cards which are linked with their identity card (Ghana Card) will prevent revenue leakage and corruption, and also make the toll collection seamless,” the firm stated in its digest.

Furthermore, PWC stressed that the tolls collected should be utilised for construction and maintenance of highways and bridges, ensuring the funds serve their intended purpose.

Government’s plan to reintroduce road and bridge tolls in 2025 has sparked considerable debate. Road tolls were suspended in 2022 and replaced with the electronic transactions levy (E-levy). Initially, the E-Levy faced resistance but managed to generate                  GH¢1.19billion in 2023. However, the performance of this levy might be threatened by recent developments in the mobile money (MoMo) sector.

According to data from the Bank of Ghana (BoG), there has been a notable decline in mobile money transactions. In June 2024, the total number of MoMo transactions fell to 644 million from the 668 million recorded in May 2024.

This decline also affected the total value of transactions, which dropped from GH¢234.3billion to GH¢224billion. Despite this overall decrease, the balance of float – representing the money held in mobile money accounts – saw a slight increase, rising from GH¢21.1billion to GH¢22.2billion.

The significant drop in MoMo transactions could impact effectiveness of the E-Levy, which has been a critical revenue stream for government. Given these circumstances, PWC’s call for a robust toll collection digital framework seems timely.

“We expect that the new framework will be as robust as possible, incorporating digitalisation in this space of revenue generation,” PWC mentioned.

This comes as concerns over the cost and reliability of mobile money (MoMo) appear to be on the rise. Over the past two weeks, several social media commentators have expressed dissatisfaction with MoMo, highlighting issues such as high transaction fees and frequent network downtimes.

These concerns were echoed in an interview with Nana Kwabena Barimah, a seller of building materials who shared his experiences and growing frustrations with the mobile money service. Barimah explained that he has increasingly turned to traditional banking services, including the use of Automated Teller Machine (ATM) cards and bank cheques, to manage his transactions.

“I use a bank that’s close to my shop, and it has served me well. The costs associated with MoMo and occasional network downtimes are becoming too much for us,” he said.

“It’s not just about the fees; it’s also about the reliability. There have been times when I couldn’t complete transactions due to network issues, which affects my business operations. With my bank, I have more consistent access to my funds and the transaction fees are more predictable,” he added.

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