'Failure' of Dartford Crossing details for foreign drivers

The toll booths on the Kent side of the crossing were replaced at the end of November

The AA has said attempts to inform foreign drivers about the new Dartford Crossing payment system have failed, with one in four overseas drivers not paying the charge.

Between the end of November and the end of March, more than 228,000 foreign-registered vehicles failed to pay.

The new system, called Dart Charge, replaced toll booths and uses number plate recognition.

Highways England said it was pursuing "every fine".

Paul Watters, from the AA, said he was worried about awareness of the charge.

He said: "If they head to the UK they just pass a sign and probably don't realise they're going to be charged or sent a penalty if they don't pay.

"You need much, much more information - it just isn't getting through to foreign drivers."

'Higher than hoped'

He added: "Lorry drivers seem to be the better payers out of the overseas drivers - about 22% are paying - but 40% of foreign car drivers aren't paying, so clearly the messages aren't getting through."

Nigel Grey from Highway's England said: "It is difficult to get messages over, particularly to foreign users of the crossing but we've worked very hard on that.

"We've issued press releases in 27 different foreign languages, we've got foreign language leaflets which are available on ferries and both sides of the crossing.

"[The number of unpaid foreign drivers] is probably higher than we hoped.

"We haven't written any of the fines off at this stage, we're still pursuing every single one of them... [but] we will have to start writing some of them off in the future."