Highway Toll Administration LLC (HTA), a provider of electronic toll collection services to the car rental industry, has struck an agreement with ACO Rent A Car (ACO), a car-rental brand of Venezuela, serving the Miami area.

Beginning in July, HTA will provide license-plate-based video-tolling services to ACO's fleet at Miami International Airport (MIA). ACO serves six airports in Venezuela and entered the U.S. market in December 2009 at MIA.  

"HTA has the proven expertise that will enable us to provide the added convenience of electronic tolling services to our customers, improving their travel experiences by helping them reach their destinations without having to stop to at toll plazas," said ACO's Miami General Manager Ana Godoy.

HTA, which introduced electronic toll collection to the car-rental industry in 2002, also now has agreements with Payless Car Rental (Payless) and Carl's Van Rentals to provide license-plate-based video-tolling services to their rental fleets, said HTA President and CEO David Centner.

"After successfully working with a number of Payless franchisees, including the one at Newark Liberty International Airport, our association with Payless now extends to the corporate entity," he noted, adding that HTA now provides services to Payless car renters at Ft. Lauderdale/Hollywood International Airport in Florida.

In addition, said Centner, HTA was recently named the preferred vendor of electronic toll collection services for U.S. franchisees of U-Save Car and Truck Rental. U-Save, headquartered in Jackson, Miss., has 188 locations throughout the U.S., Central America and the Caribbean. 

Centner added that HTA has a contract with San Francisco's Bay Area Toll Authority (BATA) to conduct video tolling for rental cars crossing the Golden Gate Bridge, the San Francisco Bay Bridge and six other regional bridges.

"With these new contracts and relationships, HTA has increased its position as the largest third-party provider of electronic toll collection services to the car-rental industry," said Centner. "And we are confident that we will be the provider of choice for brands that want to seamlessly deliver these types of value-added services to their customers."

Centner noted that Enterprise Holdings announced in May that HTA will administer a video-toll-pass program called TollPass Automatic for the company's three car rental brands: Alamo Rent A Car, Enterprise Rent-A-Car and National Car Rental.