“This is by far the largest most challenging change I have ever seen in the deputy registrar world,” said Paula Anderson, Anoka County’s Manager of License Bureau Services.
“In theory, the system is going to be great, when all the bugs are worked out and everything works like it’s supposed to, it’s going to be a really good thing.”
But, the first few weeks of MNLARS have gone anything but smoothly. In the first few days, there were more than twenty different transactions that they simply couldn’t do. They couldn’t register unmarked police cars, they’ve had trouble with collector’s plates, and seen difficulty with people moving into Minnesota from out of state.
“What typically should be a reasonably quick transaction is taking about three times longer that it should, which is creating lines like we haven’t seen in years.”
Before the upgrade, most people were getting through Anoka County License centers in 5 to 20 minutes, but now, the average wait time is closer to 45 minutes. In the first few days of the new system, the wait time was about two hours.
Those wait times have been made better by often having a staff member make sure that waiting clients have their papers filled out correctly, and by dedicating more staff energy to the most common filings.
“We are working to get our customers – our tabs renewal and our driver’s license people – through quickly, because those are transactions that we know we can process. So, we do have a tab renewal line going most of the time and a driver’s license express line going most of the time.”
The problem is statewide and the computer software is manage by the state. Some of the problems have been fixed, but there is still a lot of work to be done.
“It’s frustrating on both sides of the counter.”
It might take a little longer for now, but at least you won’t be alone.
“Bear with us. We’re going to get through this,” said Anderson.
There is no certain date for when all of the software bugs will be fixed, so if you are headed to a license center soon, be sure to give yourself plenty of time.
