Car rental - transponder

My understanding is that a transponder is an added option (at additional cost) for some car rental companies. If that's what you want, talk to the person renting you the car. I've lived in France for over a decade and never felt the need to pay for the privilege of having a transponder. Tolls aren't difficult to manage.

It seems more common in the US to have a toll road with no convenient way for a non-local to
pay other than the electronic pass/transponder on the vehicle. Some toll booths are automated and
there is no cash or card payment and no stopping allowed. You have a few days to find the website
for that particular agency to pay online before the penalties kick in. When I spent weeks driving
around Portugal, I had more toll charges than there were obvious booths. The small cost (25E) to
activate the transponder saved me the worry and effort for those hidden tolls.

I just read (https://www.tolls.eu/france) that France also has some major roads using Free Flow tolling where it is only pay by transponder or pay online after the fact. I don't believe I will be using any of those listed roads, but it is still worth a small cost to me if I can avoid stopping for toll payments altogether.

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I don't think that getting a Liber-T transponder will be a great deal of help in your case.

Fell free to splash the cash and make some good money for the rental company, if they offer it. But for where you will be it is trivial to pay by swiping your tap and pay card, or cash if you want, and there are many posts here with links to pictures of the different things you can do in different lanes at toll plazas. You might save a few moments by going through the "t" lanes but not always.

I have a Liber-T transponder (bipper) because I drive my car from England and my wife who would be next to the toll machine is disabled and unable to help me, but I have to pay for it. There is a rental of the bipper, an annual fee, a fee every calendar month the bipper is used, even once, plus the cost of the tolls.

If you use the tap and pay credit/debit card, with the wave logo on it, as is done for many or most transactions in many European countries these days, all you do is stop at the machine, push the button (or automatic) for a ticket or tap your card to pay. It is really easy. Plenty of youtubes to hold your hand.

If you can find a rental offering a bipper you will probably only be offered it on premium cars and probably pay €15-20 per day for the privilege.

You can only rent a bipper from Liber-T yourself if you have a French bank account.

My bank does not issue touchless cards, and ApplePay is apparently not legal for tolls, so cash it is.

My bank does not issue touchless cards

That's extremely retro of them.

tns 1,
Perhaps you could get a travel-focused credit card to use for these type of trips, one with some good travel perks? Having retired from 40 + years in banking, I am amazed that a bank doesn't have a touchless card. As I understand it "touchless" and "tap and pay" are interchangable terms, also known as "contactless". Are you thinking of anything in particular regarding "touchless"? Maybe you already have a tap and pay card, with the wave-like symbol on it. It's worth inquiring at your bank. Maybe the bank personnel is confused about the terms. Sometimes credit unions and very small local banks are more limited in their offers. Some family members couldn't get cash from any ATMs in Spain a couple of years back because the small credit union they banked with wasn't set up well for overseas ATM debit card use. It happens. We all just got extra cash for them and they paid us back when we got home. Their credit card did work at hotels, shops, etc. Just the debit card was a problem. If I were you, I would investigate a bit further at my bank. Best of luck to you!

Update:
Had a great time. Our debit cards worked fine on bank ATMs, but there were only a few times where the Apple Pay could not be used. The car rental agent said that Apple Pay/Google Pay are now legal to use for tolls, but we did have a tap to pay CC and used that instead. Probably paid some 25 tolls and never ran into the "Free Flow" transponder only situation. We had a 4 door compact, but there were times I wished I had gone for a smaller 2 door for some parking challenges and narrow twisting streets. The biggest risk of damage to the car is in the parking garages where a door ding is almost guaranteed. Our rental had only 3000km on it but already had large dents and scratches. We took good photos of every imperfection before we drove off, and did need to show that evidence during the return inspection. The pre-damage report from EuropCar is just a few brief sentences where a sketch or photo is really what you want them to have.

I'm glad that the tap to pay CC worked for you. I know last month you were frustrated because your bank didn't issue them.

Did you go somewhere else, or was it lost in translation with your bank and they had them after all?

How did you like the Autoroutes to drive on?

Often a 2 door car has longer doors than the same car in 4 door, because they can get further down the car since there's no rear door, and it leave more room for back seat passengers to climb out.

My GF had a tap card which is faster to use than cash or phone. It is great when traveling since we made lots of small payments for metro, bus, parking, food. I don't make many card payments at home so a chip card is fine.

The A and D roads we took were are all in great condition and many looked like they had been resurfaced in the last few years. Roads in rural parts or in towns were still in good condition but narrower than what I am used to with sometimes impossibly sharp turns. The car had all the new features that nag you if it thinks you are speeding, or too close to the edge, or wandering around the lane, but it didn't always agree with the posted speeds. There were a few times when I was cruising along at 80kph, and suddenly the car warns me to drop back to 50kph, only to resume back up to 80 after a very short time. There was nothing about the road situation (intersection or pedestrians) that justified these abrupt (and dangerous) speed changes, but they may have been speed traps. Other cars were not hitting the brakes so I hope it was nothing.

There was nothing about the road situation (intersection or
pedestrians) that justified these abrupt (and dangerous) speed
changes.

Perhaps the system recognized a sign indicating the entrance to a town/village.
Even if there is no speed limit sign, and unless otherwise indicated, crossing towns and villages is limited to 50 km/h by default.
That said, it surprises me because my car, which is very recent and has all these latest-generation systems, makes some errors recognizing the speed limit, but it doesn't know how to recognize situations involving the entrance to a town/village without a speed limit sign.
There is always a way to disable all or part of the system, but I imagine that on vacation you have better things to do than navigate menus and settings.