The proposal for the 2012 tax year (that is, the one for which taxes were due on May 1, 2013) was that refunds would be issued on a debit card rather than with a paper check, for those who do not have direct deposit. I see they want to do that this year too.

Virginia Tax Refund Debit Card
http://www.tax.virginia.gov/site.cfm?alias=refunddebitcards

What is the Virginia Tax Refund Debit Card?

The Virginia Tax Refund Debit Card is a MasterCard® debit card that gives you easy access to your tax refund. The Commonwealth has contracted with Xerox State and Local Solutions, Inc., to use their Go Program® to manage the Virginia Tax Refund Debit Card program.

The 2013 General Assembly approved language that requires income tax refunds to be issued by direct deposit or on a prepaid debit card as a cost savings measure for the Commonwealth. Paper checks are no longer an option for receiving your tax refund.
....

Please review the complete schedule of fees so that there are no surprises.

With your new debit MasterCard®, you join an elite group of cardholders who receive funds through the Go Program®.

does the same thing and it came back to really bite them if I remember.

They switched contractors and didn't vet the new contractor to make sure their new system was compatible with the old system.

And if I remember correctly, they didn't do a total switchover to the new contractor and ended up with commuters not able to use their transpounder universally.

<added on edit> My new state, Indiana, contracts EVERYTHING. And is constantly looking for new contract opportunities.

understand how a guy who's spent most of his adult life in government became a millionaire. I've worked in the public sector for over 30 years & live paycheck to paycheck. That damned conscience of mine is such an inconvenience!

He's their all-time top contribution recipient.

http://influenceexplorer.com/organization/ace-cash-express/ec99b77615e34a03b409be225a7b7304?cycle=-1

Corrupt bastards.

I have an EZ pass and a Sun Pass and was able to do everything on line. No need to go anywhere.

that is NOT the case

At some point, instread of being sheared, sheeple gotta say NO!

boycotted.

http://www.fin24.com/Companies/Financial-Services/Spain-to-rescue-empty-toll-roads-20131128

will continue until moral improves.

shark?

Indiana, Ohio, Wisconsin, Michigan, etc.

didn't know they were being privatized, too.

Local bond issue. In Harris County--same state, same laws--the toll roads are essentially "private" in the sense that the Harris County Toll Road Authority builds them and maintains them without tax money. It has a bond issue supervised by the state that it pays off using its toll funds; it pays for its own staff and facilities.

Tolls mostly go for maintaining roads that are paid off (if there are any at this point) and for making bond payments. In addition to tolls, it charges a $15 set up fee for toll-payment accounts.

Some of the local toll roads are also co-extensive with tax-funded state highways, which creates a bit of a problem because those can't be toll roads (unlike in some states--so I-95 in MD was a toll road, and I've been on the Pennsylvania Turnpike; I think an interstate in OK or OH/IN was also a toll road, but it's been a while since I've been on them).

The local workaround to having a toll state highway was to have the frontage road bear the official designation. So Hwy 8 is the loop around Houston. Some was built with public funds and is free. Other places were built with HCTRA funds and the official "Hwy 8" has traffic lights, is the access road, and is free.

There are also toll-access HOV lanes on public freeways, built with HCTRA money and not tax money.

I noticed that so many of the outsourcing moves are based on long term contracts, 20, 30 years. That means that even if a democratic regime takes over, they are still burdened with this contract and cannot easily reverse it without paying penalties.

Like the parking meter business in Chicago. No wait...that wasn't a republican.

Anyway, after doing this contract where the infrastructure that was built using taxpayer money is then funnelled to the private concern to reap profits instead of providing bonus funds could have been invested into more infrastructure,

the public system that could have done this operation is then dismantled and even if the public sector wanted to bring the function back, it has to train and rebuild.

We have seen examples of this recently, like the security clearance vetting of contractors which turned out to be a joke.

So not only do these vultures rape our system, they make it nigh impossible for us to escape.

The toll authority where I live has a small number of offices set up specifically for the purpose of issuing EZ tags and collecting money for EZ Tag accounts. They piggyback on nothing.

Danged inconvenient. There are 6 locations for the county, 1700 sq miles, population over 4 million. If they set up more locations, they'd have higher overhead, increased costs.

Less for more. Never been to a payday lender, perhaps there's another way of doing it that doesn't cost more or increase the inconvenience, but it gets a lot of service locations to the population least likely to have online access.

I hope that those who want to drown the government in a bathtub are enjoying these soapy fees.

We have tolls on some of our bridges. They pay for bridge maintenance. That's it.