Dream-come-true ‘PSU’ vanity license plate leads to out-of-state toll bill nightmare for Pennsylvania woman

CARLISLE, Pa. (WHTM) — No awkward extra numbers or letters — or numbers that look kind of like letters.

There is exactly one “PSU” vanity license plate in all of Pennsylvania, and Sue Snyder of Cumberland County has it. Which was an unambiguously good thing for the first decade or so that it was in her possession.

Trouble is, it’s perhaps no surprise — with a university that claims to have the biggest alumni association in all of America — that there is also one “PSU” license plate in a lot of other states. That didn’t matter either until states started using cameras to enforce highway tolls.

“It actually started with Delaware,” Snyder said. “There was a BMW with A ‘PSU’ tag that kept going through their toll booths down there.”

And she kept getting the bills.

“I fought them for three years,” she said, sending them all the evidence they should have needed and more that she didn’t drive a BMW, never mind that — as far as she’s concerned — any state sophisticated enough to figure out her address should also be able to figure out what kind of car is on her registration.

License plates have state names on them, of course, but those can sometimes be difficult to see in photos taken from above, especially when drivers have frames around their plates.

Then came New Jersey — which she said was particularly reasonable about canceling the bills as soon as she called and pointed out the error — and Pennsylvania, where out-of-state “PSU” plates were causing her to get billed but where a PennDOT representative made a note in a system to check “PSU” photos manually before billing Snyder. Problem solved.

But Maryland?

The first bill for $2.19 — for use of I-95 express lanes in Baltimore County — came in February. With it was a photo of a car with a “PSU” license plate from an unrecognizable state and nothing else about the black sedan in common with Snyder’s white crossover.

No sooner had Snyder called the phone number on the bill and mailed the proof they requested of what car she does own than another bill came in, this time $6 for using the Fort McHenry Tunnel. She called again. An agent said the Maryland Department of Transportation (MDOT) never received the documents, but she could email them. She did that and got a reply that they were received and would be processed within five to seven business days.

But then came a ticket for $27 for not paying the other person’s toll and a threat to revoke Snyder’s registration and an invitation to ask for a court date in Maryland — and more frustrating emails and calls — and Snyder had enough. Her next call was to abc27 News.

“I thought, I’ll just call,” Snyder said. “I really didn’t think anybody would take me up on this, but I’m feeling if it’s happening to me, it’s happening to other people. And I don’t think it should be.”

abc27 News contacted MDOT, and Snyder got an email at 8:26 a.m. the next day from an MDOT agent apologizing and saying the tolls and tickets were canceled and Maryland — like Pennsylvania — had added a note in its system to review photos of “PSU” plates manually.

Snyder thanked abc27 News and said she hoped Maryland and all states would review their systems and procedures to ensure something similar isn’t happening to other people with license plate numbers so common and desirable — like the “PSU” plate she says a stranger once offered to help her sell for good money (she declined) — that they likely appear in multiple states.

Snyder guesses she’s not the only person facing the problem but might be the only one willing to fight rather than give in and pay a $2.19 bill. But she hopes her fight helps those other people.

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