At 7am, the driver’s license renewal point in Ho Chi Minh City had already posted a sign saying it was out of numbers and no longer accepting applications. Inside, hundreds of people were lining up, inside and out, waiting for their turn.
In recent days, the number of people registering to renew their driving licenses has increased dramatically, causing the application reception area of the Department of Testing and Driver License Management (Ho Chi Minh City Department of Transport) to always be full of seats.
To complete the procedure, many people have to wait for hours to submit their application. Employees at the driving license renewal points work through lunch to process the applications for people but are overwhelmed.
In the same situation, the driving license exchange point at Tien Bo Traffic College (Tan Phu district) was also overloaded for many days.
Since 7am, the school has posted a notice saying 'out of numbers', along with the reason that the driver's license ink has run out, so the deadline for returning the driver's license today has been postponed to March 15.
Many people who came to check in at this time did not receive a queue number and were forced to leave.
Inside, hundreds of people filled the rows of seats, even lining up in the parking lot. Security guards were on duty, maintaining order and guiding people through procedures amid the overload.
Although he arrived at 5am, Mr. Nguyen Van Tai (living in District 12) had to work very hard to get number 250 to complete the procedure to change his B2 license to C1.
“The day before, I was late and had to leave because there was no more queue number. Learning from experience, I arrived earlier this morning but hundreds of other people were there,” said Mr. Tai.
He also said that yesterday he took advantage of the time to get a medical examination and take a photo in advance to save time. However, this morning the number of people who were renewing their passports was so large that he had to wait for hours before his turn came.
Ms. Tran Thi Ha (living in Tan Binh) said that she had to write a leave application to the company to change her B1 driver's license to B. Because the number of people coming to do the procedure was too large, she was worried that she would not be able to submit her application on the same day.
Ms. Ha said she heard that many people forgot to take the theory test when it was time to renew their driver's license, so they had to retake it according to the new law.
"My driver's license will expire in 20 days, but I updated the new law and found that even if it is just 1 day past the expiration date, I will have to retake the theory test. Therefore, I am trying to get it renewed soon because if I forget, it will be very troublesome," said Ms. Ha.
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Pressure to renew driver's license for 2 reasons
Sharing with VietNamNet reporter , Ms. Tran Thi Bich Thao - Vice Principal of Tien Bo Traffic College acknowledged the 'pressure' in the work of issuing and exchanging driving licenses at the school.
Firstly, according to Circular 35/2024 effective from January 1, 2025, a driver's license that has expired for just 1 day must retake the theory test; while the old regulation was that it had expired from 3 months to less than 1 year.
Second, Ho Chi Minh City is lacking blanks and printing materials, so there are more than 170,000 driver's licenses of all kinds in stock.
"The above two reasons put a lot of pressure on the school's renewal points, unable to meet the needs of the people. Every day, the center receives about 500-650 applications. Of which, it maintains the issuance of more than 400 direct registration numbers to prioritize the settlement of car driving licenses that are about to expire.
About 200 applications for motorbike driving license renewal must be registered online or via the hotline. Those with long-term licenses will be instructed to come back later to reduce the workload," Ms. Thao emphasized.
In addition, Ms. Thao informed that the driver's license exams from November 2024 to now have not been able to return the driver's license to the passing students.
"The school promised that after 2-3 weeks of passing the exam, students would receive their driving license, but due to a lack of blanks and ink, it took longer. This made students upset and the school was under pressure. They explained, but they only sympathized to a certain extent...", Ms. Thao said.
Overtime units, find solutions
According to the Ho Chi Minh City Department of Transport, from October 2024 to now, the number of people registering to renew their driving licenses has increased dramatically (as of December 2024, it was nearly 890,000 blanks). From January 13 to 24, there were about 12,000 applications for renewal and re-issuance. At the same time, Ho Chi Minh City is facing some difficulties such as lack of blanks, lack of materials for printing driving licenses...
In the coming time, the city will focus on printing and returning driver's licenses for new and renewal applications submitted before December 2024.
The Department will organize overtime and increase working hours to receive people's applications, trying to respond as much as possible.
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Source: https://vietnamnet.vn/doi-giay-phep-lai-xe-o-tphcm-xep-vong-trong-vong-ngoai-moi-7h-da-het-so-thu-tu-2371559.html
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