'Like Private Property'... Driver Fails to Pay Highway Tolls 3,382 Times, Owing 12.04 Million Won

Over the past five years, the number of vehicles that have repeatedly failed to pay highway tolls and have illegally passed through toll booths has exceeded 2.55 million. During the same period, it was also found that excessive tolls amounting to 1 billion won were charged due to system errors by the Korea Expressway Corporation, raising calls for improvements to the overall toll collection system.

On the 2nd, vehicles are congested on the southbound lanes of the Gyeongbu Expressway near Jamwon IC, Seocho-gu, Seoul. Photo by Yonhap News

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According to data submitted by the Korea Expressway Corporation to Assemblywoman Lee Yeonhee of the Land, Infrastructure and Transport Committee of the National Assembly on October 3, a total of 2,559,000 vehicles failed to pay tolls more than 20 times between 2020 and August 2025. The Korea Expressway Corporation classifies these vehicles as habitual toll evaders, imposing an additional toll charge equivalent to ten times the unpaid amount. If payment is not made even after the first to third notices, the corporation initiates compulsory collection procedures, such as vehicle seizure.

By year, the figures were 298,000 vehicles in 2020, 418,000 in 2021, 398,000 in 2022, 430,000 in 2023, and 558,000 in 2024. As of August 2025, the number has already reached 457,000, with a monthly average of 57,000 vehicles, showing a faster increase compared to the previous year’s monthly average of 47,000.

In the most extreme case, one driver failed to pay a total of 12.04 million won over 3,382 instances. Another case involved 9.128 million won in unpaid tolls over 2,140 instances, and there were a total of five cases where drivers failed to pay tolls more than 1,000 times.

Assemblywoman Lee emphasized that habitual non-payment increases administrative costs and shifts the burden onto other highway users. She stressed the need to strengthen legal sanctions to encourage payment and reduce notification costs. In fact, the cost of unpaid toll notifications rose from 4 billion won in 2020 to 4.9 billion won in 2022, 6.2 billion won in 2023, and 4.4 billion won had already been spent by August 2025, with the monthly average exceeding 500 million won.

On the other hand, there have also been hundreds of thousands of cases where highway tolls were excessively charged, with the total overpaid amount reaching about 1 billion won during the same period.

According to data submitted by Assemblywoman Kim Heejeong of the People Power Party, there were more than 390,000 cases of incorrectly charged tolls between 2020 and July 2025. Of these, the Hi-Pass system accounted for 125,000 cases, totaling 640 million won, while the One Tolling system accounted for 265,000 cases, with 350 million won erroneously collected.

The refund rate for Hi-Pass was relatively high at 94%, but for the One Tolling system, it was only 78%, leaving more than 100 million won still unrefunded. The main causes cited were communication errors and vehicle license plate recognition errors.

Between 2020 and 2024 alone, the One Tolling system experienced a total of 354,000 cases of communication failures and license plate recognition errors. Assemblywoman Kim pointed out the need to replace outdated equipment and establish a system that allows for automatic refunds to address these issues.

Ultimately, as both habitual toll evasion and excessive charges occur simultaneously, there is a growing consensus that more sophisticated legal measures and improvements to digital infrastructure are urgently needed for the highway toll system. Experts noted that only by implementing strong sanctions against repeated non-payment and automated refund procedures for overpayments can the fairness and reliability of the highway toll collection system be restored.

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