A Montreal man says he's frustrated with the private company that manages the toll bridge on Highway 25 linking Montreal and Laval.
Gary Yamamoto says a trip that was supposed to cost him $8, is now costing him more than $40.
People who use the bridge regularly can open an account with the company, called Concession A25, and are outfitted with a transponder. Everyone else can cross the bridge and be billed retroactively.
Yamamoto says he wasn't billed for his trip on Jan. 12 until last week, when he received a bill for $45.52 — in an envelope marked "final notice".
He was also warned that if he didn't pay the full amount, that the file would be sent to the justice ministry, and that the bill would jump into the hundreds of dollars.
Apparently, Yamamoto isn't alone in having a beef with the company. A Radio-Canada report from last year told the story of another man who used the bridge once each way in September 2015, and didn't get his "final notice" containing a similar markup until December.
In fact, he received two "final notices" — one for each trip.
That report suggested others had the same problem. At the time, a spokesperson for Concession A25 insisted the original invoices had been printed and sent off.
Officials with the consumer group Union des Consommateurs suggest the "recovery fees" are abusive — and aren't in line with the kinds of late fees that get charged in other domains, both public and private.