Turnpike system back online after days of malfunctions
The computer system at the Oklahoma Turnpike Authority went down for several days over the past week, blocking customers from accessing their Pikepass accounts.
A spokesman for the authority said that the issues appeared to be resolved Wednesday morning, clearing the way for Pikepass payments and applications. Jack Damrill confirmed that the outage first happened Friday as the agency installed upgrades to the system.
“We were upgrading our storage solutions and during that upgrade, we had a hardware failure that occurred, which caused the outages,” Damrill said.
The system was intermittently available Sunday and again Tuesday, but each time it came back online the Turnpike Authority later tweeted that it was still experiencing issues. Because of the outage, customers were not able to update their Pikepass information, make payments or request an account that allows travelers to use Oklahoma turnpikes without stopping to pay at a toll booth. The agency’s website was also affected, meaning customers couldn’t reach Pikepass.com.
Local tag agencies couldn’t access the site either, and the authority’s email system went down for a short time as the outage began.
“Initially during the outage, the website was completely down and customers weren’t able to make payments, add cars, get Pikepasses. They weren’t able to do anything,” Damrill said.
Despite that, Damrill said, Pikepass enforcement was not affected and data from roadside meters can now be processed by the Turnpike Authority.
The outage caused frustration for current and prospective Pikepass owners, including several who shared their frustration on social media. Sandy Redmond tweeted that she tried to call several times and suggested that people with a Pikepass shouldn’t be charged for the days when the system was down.
Redmond told The Oklahoman that she is trying to sell her son’s car, which has a Pikepass sticker, and called to have it canceled.
“I finally took the tag off his windshield even though the tag says not to do that. I did not want to be charged the tolls of the person purchasing the vehicle,” Redmond said. “I just feel we should not have to pay the tolls when there is a systemwide outage that affects all of us.”
The Oklahoma Turnpike Authority has its own information technology division, so the outage and repairs didn’t cost the agency any extra money to fix. Damrill said customers’ information wasn’t compromised and remains safe.
“It’s caused our customers inconvenience, obviously, that we deeply regret. We try to strive for the best customer service and when this issued happens, it upsets the customers and it upsets us because we never want an outage like this to happen,” he said.