DMV’s new appointment system off to sluggish start in Las Vegas Valley

The rollout of the Department of Motor Vehicles’ new appointment system has been anything but smooth over the first two days.

For a second-straight day, the new queuing system experienced technical difficulties, only partially functioning in the four DMV offices in the Las Vegas Valley.

Customers have been split into two lines — one line for those with confirmed appointments and another for walk-in customers — and are being called up manually, according to Kevin Malone, DMV spokesman.

The issues spread to the DMV’s web page for booking appointments Tuesday afternoon when the site was experiencing intermittent outages.

The system’s developer, Swedish company Qmatic, has been working on both issues on site at DMV offices and online.

It appears that after working out some of the kinks over the first two days, relief is in sight for the department.

“The DMV is expecting the system to be fully functional tomorrow (Wednesday),” Malone said. “The technical issues have been corrected and the entire system appears stable at this point.”

Last summer the DMV’s scheduling system was temporarily shut down after its previous appointment system vendor, Qless, suffered a computer server outage. That outage led to the loss of appointments booked online over a week’s period, resulting in customers double booking appointment times. The department went on to honor all double-booked appointments.

Las Vegas has been without the appointment service since Jan. 1, as the DMV moved toward implementation of the new system.

The Reno and Carson City DMV offices saw the system rolled out in February, with no issues.

The benchmark waiting time for walk-in customers is under 1 hour. With an appointment, the wait is under 10 minutes, according to Tonya Laney, a field services administrator with the DMV.

Customers can set an appointment on the Dash Pass section of the DMV website by choosing their preferred date and time. Motorists are urged to arrive 10-15 minutes ahead of their scheduled appointment time and to have the required documents and any forms filled out ahead of any transaction.

The new system, once fully operational, will enable the DMV to double the number of available appointments.

Over 1.2 million appointments will be available annually statewide under the new system, up from 663,000 with the old system.

The new system also offers improved capabilities and options over the previous system. Eight services will be available for appointment setting, including the newly added driver’s license written tests, reinstating a suspended driver’s license or registration, Malone said.

Contact Mick Akers at makers@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-2920. Follow @mickakers on Twitter.