Drivers penalised due to the IT “shambles” surrounding the new Dart Charge system should have their penalty charges revoked.

That’s according to Roads Minister Richard Holden who wrote to Dartford MP Gareth Johnson this week, in response to the litany of problems encountered by motorists over the summer

It comes after National Highways brought in a new company Conduent, to handle vehicle identification, payments and accounts for the Dartford Crossing at the end of July.

With many struggling to update their accounts, pay charges or speak to anyone at the call centre, others have reported being charged when they haven’t even used the crossing, prompting calls to sort out the “shambles”.

Residents in north Kent also reported problems with their Local Resident Discount Scheme (LRDS) accounts, used to make unlimited trips over the crossing for a reduced fee of £20 a year.

In his letter to Mr Johnson, the government's head of roads and local transport said a “fix has now been deployed”, and that the deadline for updating LRDS accounts had been extended until September 30.

Acknowledging the issues with the new system, Mr Holden wrote: ”Following the changeover to the new payment service, there has been very high customer demand.

“Over 1 million individual customers have used the website, 40,000 have opened new accounts and over 404,000 have updated their payment card details. In addition, 1.2 million payments have been made across the multiple channels and account types.

“While the system is working well for the vast majority of customers, National Highways recognises that some have encountered technical problems and it has been acting quickly to solve these with the system supplier, Conduent.”

He added: “To alleviate some of the concerns expressed by local residents, all LRDS plans due to expire between 1 July and 31 August have had the expiration date extended to 30 September.

"At present Dart Charge has not issued any Penalty Charge Notices (PCN) for crossings made between 27 and 15 August, therefore any information regarding LRDS (or any other) customers receiving PCNs would be appreciated so they can be investigated further by National Highways."

Mr Holden said 62,000 calls had been answered in relation to the Dart Charge since July 28, and 44 additional staff members have been recruited to the customer call centre to help deal with the situation, but that waiting times stood at 45 minutes.

He added: “I recognise that these waiting times are not acceptable and National Highways are working closely with Conduent to ensure these are reduced.

“Online, the system is servicing over 40,000 customers each day, with no waiting time. I am acutely aware that no one who has tried to pay the Dart Charge over the last month but has been unable to do so because of technical issues should be penalised for that.

Anyone receiving a penalty charge notice for unpaid journeys in that period will have two weeks to respond where they can pay at the original charge rate. In addition, National Highways will consider fairly any appeals against a penalty that people may make.”

Meanwhile social media sites and review website Trustpilot have been inundated with reports of people struggling to pay charges, update details, and get through on the phone system to talk to operators.

‘The Dartford Crossing used to be a really good system but since this change it's killed it’

Among those struggling with the new system was Craig Covington from Strood, a fleet operations manager for two major companies, who said the stress was so much he felt like taking matters into his own hands.

“Our business is having £200-£300 taken out every day,” he said. “They're calling it an automatic top-up, but when you go online you can't correct it.

“I've got trackers on all our vans, and I can tell we're not going across that many times a day. It's so stressful dealing with this account.

“I deal with business all day long – we have vehicle breakdowns and you deal with it, but this is the most stressful part. You think to yourself you're never going to get it sorted, and ultimately responsibility lies on me, so I'm going to cop it if it goes wrong.

“There's nobody to talk to at the Dartford Crossing. The only people you can talk to are the fixed penalty people because they think they're going to get money out of you. When you try to speak to the account department you can't get through to anyone.”

He said the issue was now affecting his mental health, adding: “I don't back the people that got on the bridge to protest about oil, but it's led me to the point where I'm thinking I'll take my car to the top of the bridge and I'll block it to get a reaction.

“I don't want to get involved in breaking the law but it makes you feel I could get hold of a lot of operators and do what the French used to do when they blocked the ports. It gets you thinking that way. I'll stick a load of vehicles on top of the bridge and cause havoc.

“The Dartford Crossing used to be a really good system but since this change it's killed it.”

MP Gareth Johnson said he had been contacted by numerous residents about the issue, adding: “The change over to the new system has been a shambles.

“I met with National Highways before the change took place and was assured by them that their IT systems could cope but that clearly has not been the case.

“I asked them to put more resources into the change over, and the situation is now improving but it is still taking people a long time to have their phone calls answered or to receive a response to their e mails.

“The bottom line though is that they had two years to prepare for this changeover and they decided to carry it out during the busiest month of the year for the crossing.”

National Highways was asked for a comment on the situation.

A spokesman explained why some accounts had been de-activated or suspended, stating: “If an account balance drops below £0, or if a valid payment method is removed the account will suspend. The account holder will get notification asking them to correct the account, crossings will still go to an account during the suspension period, and if the account is corrected those crossings will be paid via the account.

“The extended account suspension periods have ended, that means if action to correct the suspension hasn't taken place, then the account will move to a dormant status. This means that crossings will not allocate to accounts and must be paid for by other means.”

Addressing Dart Charge “balance problems”, they added: “We aren’t aware of any issues surrounding this, so further details will need to be investigated.

“As a result of the extended payment deadline, crossings since July 27 may not be visible on your account. By August 31, all accounts should be up to date with all crossings, and these will reflect in the customer’s account balance.”

The spokesman also addressed the problems with LRDS, adding: “To alleviate some concern, we have extended the renewal date by a month for an LRDS account due to renew between July 27 and August 31.”