Revenue Commissioner: Online car registration system on track for July

A solution to vexing delays for the registration of vehicles remains on track for July, Revenue Commissioner Louisa Lewis-Ward assured Wednesday.

Lewis-Ward offered an apology to frustrated Barbadians who have been bombarding social media and radio with bitter complaints about the registration system’s delays.

She took to Voice of Barbados radio to disclose that the Barbados Revenue Authority has received about 3,000 applications and the process has been set back by a number of issues.

The Revenue Commissioner said: “There are delays for a number of reasons, right now we have incomplete applications of over 250 where people have not submitted the right documentation,” she said, indicating that BRA would increase advertising to inform the public about what is required.

“We do also have some delays on the payment side of things and in that respect, once those payments are made then we can issue the final application.

“But really the delays that have come, have come within our internal team as we do cross-check of engine numbers, chassis  numbers against what is on the documentation provided and that has caused us somewhat of a delay.”

Lewis-Ward said the BRA decided to put the process online to ease the usual long wait and efforts were ongoing to make the process seamless.

She said: “What we are working on currently in conjunction with the licensing authority is a fully automated system, and the system will cross-check with Customs, it will cross-check with the Licensing Authority; it will do a  third check against the insurance documentation and you will get an automatic reply once the data all matches up and it will give you your registration certificate in real-time.  So that is where we are working to get to at the beginning of July.” (SD)