HALTON residents are being urged to renew their user discounts for the Mersey Gateway before Sunday.

On Sunday, the Mersey Gateway Bridge will celebrate its one-year anniversary but up to 7,000 people still need to renew their plans for 12 months discounted travel.

Merseyflow, the tolling operator, has contacted everyone who registered for discounts before the bridge opened.

If eligible Halton residents don’t renew their accounts they will have to pay for their crossings from Sunday.

Anthony Alicastro, managing director of Merseyflow, reminded residents that it only takes 10 minutes to renew their plans.

He said: “We’re making great progress renewing the accounts of eligible residents, but we want to make one last push to ensure everyone who is entitled to the discount renews their account.

“Renewing online is the quickest and easiest way to renew.

“We know from experience that there was a huge rush to register just before and just after the bridge opened last year.

“We started contacting residents in July to urge them to renew.

"In a relatively short space of time we have renewed 20,000 accounts but there’s still plenty of people who need to renew.”

Halton residents must renew their plan every 12 months to ensure their details are correct and they continue to qualify for their discount scheme.

More than 99 per cent of Halton residents can benefit from the local user discount plan that was set up by Halton Borough Council.

It allows them to make unlimited personal journeys on the bridge once they have paid a £10 annual administration fee.

The scheme is only open to Class two vehicles and business trips must be declared and paid for separately.

Eligible Halton residents can re-apply at merseyflow.co.uk or in person at merseyflow’s walk-in centre, in Manor Park, Runcorn.