Is it true that I have to buy a tax sticker or disk at the border in order to drive across Austria for less than a week? I will be renting a car in Munich and driving in Czeck.,Slovakia, Hungary and Austria. Any other informationon this?

ttr

The following is from the Austria web site: Toll stickers are required on all vehicles on Austria's motorways and highways!
Stickers can be obtained from the Austrian Automobile Clubs as well as post offices, sundries and gasoline stations. Please note that stickers are also available in Austria's neighboring countries at gasoline stations, at borders as well as Automobile clubs.

The following fees apply:
A twelve-months sticker for private cars amd motorhomes weighing up to 3.5 tons is EURO 72,60 and for motorcycles EURO 29.00

A two-months sticker for travel to and through Austria is EURO 21.80 for private cars and motorhomes up to 3.5 t

A 10-day sticker for cars and vehicles up to and incl. 3.5t is EURO 7.60

These stickers must be applied on the upper middle or left side of the windshield. Motorists who do not possess the appropriate sticker will have to pay a fine of EURO 220.00. Cars rented in neighboring countries may or may not be equipped with the sticker. Please obtain one from your car rental agency.

As you approace Austria on A-8 from Munich, the signs for the rest areas that have service stations selling the vignette have a section on the upper left stating that they sell the vignette. One other note, don't be in a hurry to buy gasoline in Germany before you enter Austria. Three weeks ago we found that gasoline was less expensive in Austria. There is a gas station just beyond the border and quite a few others along A-1.

I was in all four countries last week. The Austrian sticker was part of the rental car payment, but I had to buy a sticker for Hungary and Slovak Republic. I didn't need one for the Czech Republic. Even though I was just driving though for an hour the border guards of the Slovak Republic made me buy a sticker for 6 Euros!. Hope this helps.

The Polizei Osterreich are among the least friendly, but when I spoke halting German, they "let us slide" without a sticker.
The seemingly almost as unhappy Pol. Schweiz made us buy a "sticker" to travel their Auotbahnen.
If you are on a Motorcycle, I think they all ignore tariffs and tolls.
I always return cars with stickers, but I think the rental car employees confiscate them for their own use.
M

Hi

"I always return cars with stickers, but I think the rental car employees confiscate them for their own use."

If you apply them to the windscreen, they are almost impossible to reuse.

However I "understand" that if you apply them to clingfilm, then stick the clingfilm to the screen it is virtually undetectable.

It is probably very illegal !

Peter

Peter,
When has that deterred anyone??
M

fildan.. "I didn't need one for the Czech Republic".....We picked up our rental car in Vienna...the sticker for Austria was already on the car....however, when we were driving in the CR, we were waved down on a country road by a policeman and made to pay $15, "no receipt" or $100 "with receipt". Then when we got to the border, passing into Slovakia, The CR border police demanded the same. We said we had no more Chech money...they laughed and shrugged and let us know we were not crossing the border until they had been payed....where do you think that money ended up???? It left us with a very bad taste for the Czech Republic...Mary

To use expressways (Autobahn) other than the A13 Brenner, A9 Pyhrn, A10 Tauren, and S16 Arlberg Tunnel you must purchase and display on your vehicle a vignette.

To use those expressways listed above, you simply pay their tolls?although said vignette entitles you to a 15 percent discount.

Choose from 10-day, 2-month, and annual vignette. They are sold at entry points onto the expressway system (look for the sign reading "Verkaufen&quot, at border crossings, fuel stations and post offices and cost as follows:
10-day 2-month annual
EUR7.80 21.80 72.60

Motorcycle vignettes cost a bit less.

The fine for not displaying such disc when using a corresponding expressway is EUR220 for cars, EUR110 for motorcycles.


http://www.ideamerge.com/motoeuropa/austria/chapter/

mcmrjm, it sounds like these police spoke English. I'd have asked to see their identification -- you have every right to -- and then written down their names and numbers telling them you need it for your business records. I'd pay it if they still insisted, but let them know I was checking the amount with officials later.

Patrick...The only English word they used, and very sternly, I might add, was "PROBLEM", "PROBLEM" as they pointed to our windshield. We had not read or heard about the necessary stickers and felt that the rental agent should have forewarned us since they knew which countries we would be traveling through. They were actually quite surly, and although your suggestion is well taken, I would have been afraid to try to get that information from them, if we even could have made them understand what we wanted. Mary

humanone--last summer we drove from Munich to Vienna and then to Italy without the vignette. But we made sure that we were not using the super highway. The one problem with this is that Austria does not sign the alternative routes very well, and the going is much slower.

You also might want to check if you need an International Drivers License.
I needed one to RENT a car in Austria, but I don't know if you need one if you would be stopped for any reason on the roads in Austria.