The month of August has been full of challenges for DMV, its employees, and its customers, but every challenge is an opportunity to improve. We saw wait times at DMV offices spike, we experienced multiple internet and technology challenges across the state, and the vendor that prints North Carolina driver licenses had a printing problem that impacted approximately 2,400 licenses of drivers under 21. In each of these instances, we have opportunities to better serve the people of North Carolina and we are already taking steps to do just that.
North Carolinians who visit our DMV offices are frustrated by long wait times, and so are all of us who work to serve them. To decrease wait times, we’ve set up express lines, bringing on additional customer service representatives to help people in line make sure they have the right documents and are in the correct line, established dedicated road test teams, improved our process for setting appointments, and hired more staff.
These efforts are already making progress and lines are getting shorter. The week of August 13 only 16 driver license offices had wait times of 30 minutes or less. Last week, 60 driver license offices have wait times of 30 minutes or less. The week of August 13, 23 offices had wait times up to two hours, and last week we cut that number almost in half to 12 and are working to get it to zero. We’re moving in the right direction thanks to all of your hard work, but we still have more work to do. Our customers deserve to conduct their DMV business quickly and efficiently and the benchmark for success cannot be “less than 2 hours” because our customers deserve better.
We know that demand for REAL IDs is a significant factor in the long lines customers have experienced at DMV offices this summer. The federal deadline for those who will need REAL IDs to fly or visit federal and military buildings is October 2020, and we want North Carolinians who need REAL IDs to plan ahead so they can meet that deadline. DMV has worked hard to get the word out about REAL IDs, and we have issued more than 600,000 so far. To meet demand for REAL IDs, we have worked with major employers across the state to bring our mobile units to their places of business to serve their employees. That effort has helped more than 6,000 people get their REAL IDs, helping free up capacity at our permanent DMV offices.
As part of that effort, we made appointments available to state employees for a few hours each month at our training office at DMV Headquarters. While this helped to educate state employees about REAL ID and how to obtain REAL ID, it has been stopped and will not be restarted. Already, DMV employees who worked in that training office have been deployed to other DMV offices where the need is greater. Our focus in the coming month will be on improving service in our DMV offices across the state and making our mobile offices available to communities without DMV offices, larger employers, military bases and major public events such as the State Fair.
We were deeply disappointed to learn last week that IDEMIA, a vendor that prints driver licenses for North Carolina, made errors in printing approximately 2,400 licenses. After requiring the vendor to implement new quality controls, we agreed this week to let them resume printing North Carolina driving credentials. The new measures to prevent future problems include new software to identify data inconsistencies in licenses and manual checks of the first, middle and last card in each print order before licenses are mailed. The vendor is also replacing the flawed licenses at no cost to people who received them. Today, I and a team from DMV are visiting IDEMIA’s production facility to make sure these quality controls are working. We will also implement annual audits of the vendor to prevent future problems.
These challenges drive us to look ahead and see what more we can do to modernize and improve NCDMV as the state we serve continues to grow. We are working on ways to use technology to serve our customers better, and to help you do your jobs better. In the coming months, DMV will develop a strategic plan to identify and implement additional improvements. I welcome your ideas for how we can continue to deal with our challenges and improve for the future. Every good idea will be considered as we work together to reach our goal of providing excellent service to the people of North Carolina.