NDLS downgrading to be made permanent

chasm

Guess I will have to set up one of these MyGovID accounts now!!

"Junior Transport Minister Hildegarde Naughten has confirmed the temporary Covid downgrading of all National Driving Licence Service (NDLS) offices across the State, including the Leitrim office in Carrick-on-Shannon, has now been made permanent."

". . .she told Independent Clare TD Michael McNamara in the Dáil this week, continuing: “the current NDLS contract, which was put in place with the front office service provider in 2021, no longer offers a walk-in service.”

She outlined that an online service is available for all application types but stated that a “verified MyGovlD account, which requires a public services card (PSC), is needed” to avail of the online service. “This is despite a Data Protection Commission investigation into the legality of the Public Services Card which found that there was no lawful basis for a person to be told they needed the card for anything other than accessing social welfare or benefits,” Deputy McNamara explained.

https://www.leitrimobserver.ie/news/motoring/746591/covid-downgrading-of-leitrim-ndls-office-made-permanent.html

https://www.kildarestreet.com/debates/?id=2022-02-17a.425&s=speaker%3A304#g429

user52873

Amazed there is not any outcry that this important public service is outsourced to a Swiss company and An Post was turned down in favour of them. Plus the fact they insist on the PSC card for online renewal, which as the article you linked says, should not to be used in this way. Also people cannot get through by telephone and are waiting 45mins to over an hour to get hold of someone. Guess majority of people aren't needing NDLS service and so its completely unknown.

fritzelly

Amazing how other countries get away with requiring citizens to have a national ID

Also this old people cant use computers is total baloney - had a 90 year old woman apply online and get on to the online chat to check what was happening this week in my job

It's like every change in how something is done in this country needs to be opposed

nhg

You can still book an appointment online or over the telephone to go into the ndls office to renew your license without the GovID card, just no more walk-in appointments

Dempo1

I also understood an appointment can be made online or by telephone with no requirements for a PSC. I think the minister was referring to a person processing an application in full online and that would require a PSC. However if done face to face by appointment, no PSC is required.

I believe this is more about ceasing walk in facilities and better managing NDLS offices on a pre booked appointment basis for those wishing to do applications, renewal by appointment.

The agreement reached on the PSC means the card is not a legal requirement for non SW applications and services.

Personally, I've no issue with the card, was one of the first people to be issued one and the verified mygovid account really does simply the process in relation to a number of government services, applications etc.

But I equally accept there should be choice.

user52873

From the interview I heard, after making the appointment, going to the office, a form still needs to be sent to you to be signed and be sent back. It could only be emailed back it was said.. is that right?

Pawwed Rig

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118657146#Comment_118657146

I wouldn't put an post in charge of organising a childs birthday party.

Varik

Wanted to get the public services card as it can make renewing stuff easier but i'd still need to go in to the intreo centre which seem to be 9 to 1 on weekdays near me. Can see some until 5 but none open Saturdays.

Flinty997

In the lockdown I had to renew my licence which I could do online if I had GovID. Which I couldn't get without a walk in. Catch 22.

When I finally got into the NDLS with all my documents. They didn't check them all. Said I didn't need them all. The following week I got a letter saying they were missing some documents. Had to repeat the whole process again.

I have often got a license only to find it had a mistake on it. On getting it fixed I often find a new mistake.

Similar experience getting family passports.

I’ve found the NDLS a bureaucratic pain in the arse to deal with. The county council was far, far more user friendly and efficient. It’s been a huge downgrade in “customer” experience and feels like a cold, bureaucratic French or Belgian style state service now. Don’t dot your i or cross your T … back to the start of the queue. No flexibility. No accommodation.

When I renewed my own licence they got into a fluster because one of my bills has an extra line in the address. They’re blatantly obviously the same address but the suburb comes up differently on ESB related bills and telecoms ones and I wasn’t even changing my address. It was the same as was on my previous licence.

They made my 67 year old father, who has lung issues, come in for an in person renewal in the middle of the worst aspect of the pandemic ffs and before vaccinations. He was making a huge effort to avoid getting COVID

For what exactly? To verify that he lives in the same address he’s been living in since 1995 and renew a licence with exactly the same details it’s had for decades …

We wrote to the minister and got a generic reply that was utterly dismissive and high handed. They lost a vote over it that’s for sure.

It seems like we are gone into absolute bureaucratic overkill with some of these systems.

I had the same issue with trying to get my very elderly aunt in for that ID card. She really struggled to physically get to an appointment and again to verify a load of bills and bits of paper and a fuss because one of the lines of her address has two alternative spellings on some bills.

Same garbage with her applying for visitors parking permits to Dublin City Council. No online process - post off forms, multiple bills, postal orders … 🤷‍♂️

It’s very reminiscent of France. Use the wrong shade of blue ink or have a comma out of place and they’ll reject an application.

Varik

When I tried to get a license they turned me away as the bill I'd got had the address on one page and my name on the next.

I'd to go home and then get a new bill and then I went to a new centre I could get an appointment for that same day as I can't show up any random weekday, they then threw a hissy about why I was in again the same day as it was on their system.

I'm all for making a lot of this stuff online and automated but even getting that is hard for people who work the normal hour most people do.

Hotblack Desiato

There's not any possible alternative to having people attend in person with bills etc. to verify identity and address to get them onto the system.

Once you're on the system you can apply onlilne using your verified identity.

I find it slightly amusing that one poster is complaining that some applications use the MyGovID process, then complaining that other ones don't 😀

They have to be careful with this enrolment process as it can be used to get a passport online, apply for benefits etc. so big risks for the state if someone manages to get a duplicate or false ID.

Flinty997

I got the families passports without attending online.

In fact all the information I need to get GovID I will get online.

abmoto

It's good to move to an online model, but it needs to be more flexible in terms of working hours.

The current one makes it having to take time away from work as the department works only official working hours.

The last time I tried the RSA number, I was on hold for 40 minutes.

galwaytt

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118657146#Comment_118657146

Outcry ?

The NCT was originally outsourced to a Swiss company, and latterly a Spanish one.

Hotblack Desiato

Yeah, economic nationalism is petty and outdated. How about the Irish companies doing business in the EU and further afield?

Hotblack Desiato

Yeah they need more flexible hours and, in Dublin anyway, there just aren't enough centres to cover the city. But it should be something you only have to do once.

Breezin

Have to say my experience recently with NDLS was a real PITA. Really rude and abrupt staff who actually seemed to be spoiling for a row, even though I had every i dotted and t crossed.

I'd hate to think what they'd be like if I was missing something -- probably delighted so they could tell me to get lost, which they did to someone I know who was five minutes late getting to their godforsaken, carefully hidden offices. Then again, they are a private monopoly, courtesy of our ever-so-progressive 'competition'-loving leaders, so why should they put any effort into customer relations.

I agree fully with the earlier comment that the local authority people back in the day were much more efficient and friendly, once they were properly resourced.

And now I look really, really cross in my licence picture, which I'll have for bloody 10 years! 👿

abmoto

The way in which they cropped my face on the IRP photo, there are no ears and nothing above midway on the forehead. I feel like a guy forcing his head through a gap in the fence.

I'll take looking cross any day. 😀

Breezin

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118679170#Comment_118679170

Mustn't have liked you either! 😂