This information will be important for you if you also regularly utilize Fastag. The toll plaza is reached by fastag. However, Fastag’s rules have since been altered. Since the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) has revised the new regulations pertaining to Fastag balance validation, you will no longer need to recharge your Fastag at the last minute, particularly if it is blacklisted. Two significant changes have been made to Fastag balance validation to comply with the new rules. It is crucial that users are aware of these changes, as failing to do so could result in a scenario where the Fastag reader displays error code 176 at the toll, which would prevent Fastag from accepting the toll payment. What are the revised rules for verifying Fastag balances

FASTag’s new validation rule

On February 17, 2025, the new FASTag validation rule will go into force. All transactions would be verified based on the reader, time, and low balance/blacklisting time of the tag, as to a circular issued by NPCI last month about the new rule. Code 176 will be used to reject transactions conducted on tags that are not active 60 minutes before to the reader’s read time and 10 minutes following it. What are the effects for users of the new FASTag rule?

Vehicles fall into two major states under the FASTag system.

Vehicle on the whitelist

Vehicle on a blacklist

There are various reasons to put someone on a blacklist.

Low balance

KYC has not been updated.

Details of the vehicle do not correspond with RTO records.

The NPCI has provided information on two-time frames in this circular. Ten minutes following the reader’s read time and sixty minutes before it.

Ten minutes after and sixty minutes before

The car will receive 70 minutes if the FASTag is on the exception list or hotlisted. Only if the tag has been on the hotlist or exception list for more than 60 minutes and has remained there for 10 minutes after the reader read time will the FASTag transaction be rejected. The transaction will be approved if not. Users get an extra day to recharge the FASTag as a result.