New policy might eliminates mandatory mechanic inspections for new cars

According to the Việt Nam Register agency, new vehicle owners need only present the vehicle registration certificate to a local registration centre to obtain the necessary registration stamp and purchase the road maintenance fee.

Starting July 1 of this year, newly acquired vehicles might no longer be required a mandatory mechanic examination during registration for road use under a new policy being mulled.

According to the Việt Nam Register agency, new vehicle owners would need only present the vehicle registration certificate to a local registration centre to obtain the necessary registration stamp and purchase the road maintenance fee.

The motivation behind this policy shift is to streamline the registration process and provide greater convenience for individuals and businesses.

By eliminating the need to bring new cars to registration centres physically, significant time and cost savings are expected to be realised.

The agency said that cars under nine seats are exempt from the first registration fee for 30 months, while trucks are exempt for 24 months.

According to the agency's calculation, each vehicle owner will save from VNĐ250,000-570,000 (US$10.50-24), depending on the type of vehicle, if they are exempt from the first registration fee.

Previously, the agency submitted an amendment draft to Circular 16/2021/TT-BGTVT of the Ministry of Transport on the verification of technical safety, and environmental protection and speeding up the completion of regulations on the first-time registration exemption for new vehicles.

In addition, the agency will continue to build a more comprehensive management system through the registration application, where people can book a verification appointment and pay all fees online.

National Traffic Safety Committee statistics show that about 548,000 new cars were registered nationwide last year.

If the proposal had been applied since last year, hundreds of billions of đồng could have been saved.

Currently, many vehicle registration centres have been closed down amid a widening investigation into systemic corruption case taking place at the Việt Nam Register.

As of March 1, 2023, there are 281 registration centres across the nation with 489 evaluation systems. 59 centres have been suspended, mostly in Hà Nội and HCM City, leading to serious backlog of vehicles waiting for their turns.

About 1,500 vehicle inspectors are currently working, while there need to be at least about 2,000 inspectors to meet the public demands, according to authorities.