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Remember the old days when it took forever to get anything done at the Registry?
By adamg on Fri, 03/30/2018 - 1:06pm
Wasn't it great when they installed that new computer system and everything just sped up? Wait, what? Oh. Around 12:50 p.m. Tommy Von got in line to get a ticket to get in line to get to a counter at the Watertown RMV.
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Comments
Watertown RMV
The more things change, the more things stay the same.
Time for Baker to fire the top MassDOT brass
It just isn't working out
Thanking my lucky stars
That I was born in a year that ends in a 7 and my husband was born in a year that ends in a 2.
I got my photo last year at this time, lah de dah! I don't need no stinking special star - passport for me, thank you.
well
this looks exactly like the last time i was at the watertown RMV two years ago.. the line's not any shorter, but it's not any longer either..
But without government
Who would make you stand in line?
Breweries? Night clubs? These
Breweries? Night clubs? These people chose to wait in line. Its like an extremely lame hobby for some people. They had plenty of notice about changes and lines at the RMV.
Did they?
I saw something about a closure last weekend. Nothing about ensuing lines longer than normal after that.
Did you go to MassRMV website?
They indeed did warn of this.
It was also predictable that, if they were closed for 4 days, the lines would be nasty for the next week while they caught up on those missed transactions.
But...
But it was only 3 days and 2 of those were normally closed...
Ah, the perfect life
Must be nice the have the perfect life, perfectly organized, with no lame hobbies, and with no bumps in the road that cause you to wait in a line.
Sounds kinda boring to me.
Good point
I've never had to wait in line at a store. I've certainly never seen a store that has 32 cash registers, of which 2 are open at any given moment. Only the government
I see
You don't shop at Stop N Shop?
Sarcasm
I bet that was sarcasm.
No, that was truth.
No, that was truth.
Ever been in a car wreck, Will?
Without government, you would probably be dead.
I'll be dead with government
Live free or die.
Hey, Tommy Von's band
Hey, Tommy Von's band HeadCinema is playing tomorrow at Club Bohemia in Central Sq. Check it out!
Need to bring back the arcade
If only the Watertown Mall still had The Dream Machine Arcade; the people could be playing Street Fighter or NBA Jam while they waited for their number to be called
wouldnt help, still need to
wouldnt help, still need to wait in an actual line
watertown registry/ nasty employees
i went to renew my license 2 years ago and was in line for well over 2 hours. when it was finally my turn i was behind a very nice looking, well dressed, 40ish, asian woman who was also renewing. the two female RMV employees behind the counter were very nasty to her because she got a bit confused about something that i dont specifically recall but it wasn't a big deal. they took her picture very quickly and said "NEXT!" that was me. one of the registry employee says to the other "did you see how fucked up that bitches hair was?" then she turned the monitor towards me so i could see the woman's license photo and asked me "why chinese women be so fucked up?" i was speechless. they snapped my pic and i was out. i was going to say something to someone but id already been there for 2 hours and the woman they offended was gone and never heard any of it. i know i should have said something but i was just glad to get the hell out of there.
I HAVE TO GO BACK NEXT YEAR!!!!!!
LOL
You think Watertown is nasty? Try Wilmington! They have two horrible racists who regularly make "jokes" in earshot, one decent employee with no teeth, seven "operation bootstrap" type employees with semi-functional brains, one one normally intelligent woman who acts like she is the queen of God or something and combines the nasty racism with just plain nasty beyatch.
I guess this was an attempt to reflect the community's values?
If you couldn't get terminated easily
You might be a schmuck at your job too.
But without government, who would force a person to stand in line for two hours and then insult them?
Well if you count the queue
Well if you count the queue for customer service over the phone -that's a lot of companies!
Actually
Studies find that if you don't threaten employees with easily losing their jobs, pay them well, invite them to help improve the processes they're involved in implementing, and treat them like human beings, then they usually perform better and offer better customer service.
https://www.citylab.com/life/2014/03/case-paying-service-workers-more/8506/
But you're a big fan of not paying taxes, so you get what you pay for.
Okay
Then explain to me why the RMV sucks.
Will has a point
Why do these incompetent folks still have jobs given that they are paid well in excess of what they could make elsewhere and are immune to consequences?
Because small-government zealots
keep cutting their funding, forcing them to maintain minimal staff levels and hamstringing their attempts at improving their ability to automate?
I dunno, I kinda like the idea that anyone who wants to operate a 4000-pound machine just bristling with pedestrian-killing kinetic energy has to have their license renewed every couple of years. Heck, if you left it up to me, everyone would retake their driving test twice a decade. But that would cost money, and lord knows the most important thing is keeping those taxes low
Not exactly
It is because of cronyism - these people are employed because they know somebody who got them their jobs and then shielded them from layoffs.
Say it with me
In-cen-tives. If I drive badly, then I might wreck my car, and then I have a broken car that I can't drive that I still have to pay for.
I don't need to be tested, the cost of having and keeping a car is its own motivation to do it right.
You would think...
But id-driven individuals act before carefully considering all the consequences to their long-term financial futures.
One might think this
But if most people weren’t completely terrible at making decisions based on probability, there would be no such thing as gambling.
Do you want to bet your life solely on the wisdom of schmucks with scratch-off habits, or would you like them to be required to follow rules developed on the basis of science to reduce your risk?
Ever hear of no-fault insurance, Will
You might want to look up why it failed in MA.
Why do you have to go back
Why do you have to go back next year? Aren't the pictures good for ten years? You can renew your license/reg on line.
Anyone who waits until lunchtime of the last day of the month to go there is guaranteed a shitshow, a fact since the beginning of time.
Why does last day of the month matter?
Explain.
Your license expires on your birthday.
Mass RMV upgraded their
Mass RMV upgraded their computer systems last weekend to allow them to issue Federally-compliant REAL IDs now, which will be required when boarding airlines starting in October 2020. So if people want this new ID, they must go in person and show proof of residency and have their photo retaken.
https://www.mass.gov/guides/new-massachusetts-requirements
Why are people waiting so
Why are people waiting so long if the RMV has no wait appointments? Does the system not work like it's supposed to? Most other state DMVs have online checkins, so if there's a 4 hour long wait then at least you can spend 3.5 hours waiting at home instead of at the DMV office.
did you bother reading that web link?
Those are only for specific services - like transferring over out of state plates or taking a driving test.
That was also eight years ago.
the pope declared there was no hell yesterday
changing his tune after he had to renew his registration in watertown this morning.
Farm out RMV duties to private vendors like CVS, Walgreens...
We trust highly-trained and certified non-public employees to dispense controlled substances at pharmacies, why not train and certify folks at private businesses to handle routine RMV matters under supervision? A separate window at CVS, Walgreens, Stop and Shop, Market Basket etc. I realize AAA offers something like this but motorists shouldn't be required to join an association to benefit. The auto inspection program spread out through hundreds of independent service stations and dealers is a decent example.
One of the few areas of state government that runs efficiently is the sales aspect of the state lottery. Thousands of independent sales agents (stores/bars) operating under lottery training and supervision. No outrageous lines for the customers and if the sales agent doesn't have the state's money in their dedicated "lottery-only" bank account each Friday, they are immediately taken off-line and prosecuted. A win-win, the store gets increased traffic and small percentage of sales, the state gets its money with little overhead. For those worried about fraud, the RMV seems to have a scandal every year or two, I can't see it getting much worse.
Ha ha fishy
You would be the first to pitch fits that undocumented folks were able to get minimum wage employees to take extra money to get them the ID that they needed.
Uh, no
Even in states that privatize DMV functions, drivers licenses are still handled by government employees. License plate offices get franchised out, but not licensing. It's a core government role.
What can be improved is self-service. The RMV reportedly now allows people to pre-fill their license renewal forms before they go to the office. That way you spend less time at the counter waiting while an employee reads and types and verifies your name, address, SSN, phone, etc. That should speed things up by a lot. The RMV is blaming the delays on RealID, but doesn't that just involve scanning in three or four documents? That shouldn't take long.
Not so fast
Do you really want there to be that many opportunities for low-wage workers to make some extra cash by creating legit documents for undocumented or shady folks?
What could possibly go wrong??
Internal fraud at the RMV goes back as far as Chappaquiddick
Kennedy's license was then "renewed" and backdated before the atrocity hit the press, so Registry fraud is nothing new. Like many before them, four Haymarket RMV clerks and two civilians were indicted last year for issuing licenses to illegals.
Could certified and supervised CVS or Market Basket employees do any worse? I doubt it.
They did...
...people can go to a AAA office to renew Licenses and Registrations.
The registry sucks
Or maybe its the buffoon in charge. Couldn't roll out the new inspections. Now she can't get the new licensing correctly.
Hey Baker you see this crap??????
Which buffoon would that be?
I somehow doubt that you could run it, either. It has been a mess for the entire 40 years that I have lived here.
Pollack
Thats who. By the way if I had that many people working for me, union or not. Yes I could. I would start by having evening hours. In other words Yes I could.
Hey Captain Armchair
Up up and AWAY!
REAL ID should be repealed
if this doesn't get much better within the next week or two.
Moved to MA for a couple
Moved to MA for a couple years to take a job. Left after that. Had enough. Everything is so unreasonably difficult. The climate is enough to make you head for the hills yet you throw in any inconvenience imaginable. No thanks.
Million dollar question
Did you move to Boston, or did you move to Massachusetts?
The former is a delightful city of spectator sport and art and music and smart (expletive) people of good humor who won't take your crap, but will be your friend when you need them. Also jobs. Pricey af, but you get what your pay for, and it's what you make it.
The latter is a cesspool with which I do not identify. I wouldn't wish living in a suburb (either the Hillary sign kind or the Trump sign kind) on my worst enemy.
It stopped being about state vs. other state 20 years ago. I don't know why that narrative still exists. It's about any city vs. any non city. How many of these Bostonians who move to Nashville or Austin would (expletive) with Lebanon, TN or Tyler, TX at all?
Lunchtime on the last day of
Lunchtime on the last day of the month. What a surprise.
You hush now
Shame on you, spoiling everyone's fun! Let 'em rant about how the registry is to blame for every single idiot deciding to show up at lunchtime on the last day of the month just when you also decided show up to do the business that you have to do before the end of the month. Damn those idiots! Damn the registry! It's all someone else's fault!
Teal planters...
God, that mall needs an update.
Baker fixed the RMV like he
Baker fixed the RMV like he fixed the MBTA.
Some of you are being very
Some of you are being very unfair to the Registry.
After all, who could possibly have thought that there was a chance that implementing a tech change late in the month - which you know is a peak demand period for your customer base but especially in a week with important cultural/religious obligations that cut down available time for a chunk of that customer base - would be a problem?
It's not like they had a relevant example - like changing the inspection computers and a lot of the new computers not working and losing days of productivity approaching the end of the month - to point to and say "Don't let anything like that happen again!"
On a side note
The Watertown mall is one of the most depressing places I’ve been
I bet
You never had the pleasure of visiting the Intown Mall in downtown Lawrence. To enter, you got to walk the gauntlet of drunk panhandlers. Then you passed through an uninviting aperture into the middle of a low-ceilinged, dimly-lit concrete tunnel, with empty, unlit storefronts on both sides. At one end, a lit-up barbershop. At the other end, a DMV office! It was the kind of place that Snake Plissken would shoot his way out of.
Intown Mall?
Is that still standing? If so, I might want to take a few photos for the Dead Mall Enthusiasts Facebook group.
I don't know
I haven't been in Lawrence for a long time. They've probably turned it into a mushroom farm or something.
Lawrence RMV
I might have missed something, but it is in a strip mall now.
Yes
All my discussion about Lawrence was in the past tense. Before it moved to the strip mall, it was in a lumber yard.
Watertown Mall
is just a Target, a Best Buy, the Registry, and a few small shops in between. It used to also have an Old Country Buffet, but that closed a couple of years ago when that company went bankrupt.
Coming soon
Joyful Gardens is going in the Old Country Buffet space. They’re moving from the Days Inn on Soldiers Field Road into the Watertown Mall.
The Scientology/ Dianetics
The Scientology/ Dianetics cart still set up next to the RMV line in Watertown?
I saw a Jehovah's Witness cart there
but not Scientology.
It’s not a cart
It’s a rolling suitcase.
Simple Solution
I renewed my drivers license online and my passport by mail both were quick and efficient, but my drivers license is not a "real id" so in 2 years it wont work as id in federal buildings meaning I'll either have to get a new license or lug my passport around. If a person has the same name, same address, same date of birth and same social security number (even s drivers licenses have social security numbers on file) for both their drivers license and US passport chances are its the same person. Why cant the feds and state talk to each other.
If both the drivers license and US passport are the same name, same address, same date of birth and same social security number and have been so for over x number of years said persons ought to be able to get a real id drivers license online by simply putting their passport number on the drivers license renewal, which the state could simply verify with the feds
It is a little odd
That it is now easier to renew a passport than a drivers license.
Super Annoying
When my boys got their IDs a couple years ago, they said that the passport only counts for one type of ID OR a signature.
I'm like WTF? So they had to have their Birth certificates AND their Social Security Cards (piece of paper) AND their passports. Why? When we already presented the same stuff to get the passports?
Then when my son got his learner's permit, they also required something with his address on it BUT a financial aid form from UMass (aka a GOVERNMENT document) sent to our house Did Not Count.
Fucking headdesk.
Wait until you have to renew their passports
If they'll be under 16 when you renew, you now have to fill out New Passport applications, and provide all the same ID. The old passport doesn't count as a valid ID, but you still have to submit it. This protects us from immigrant children stealing our jobs or blowing up our roller rinks, or something.
Why cant the feds and state
That's the point of RealID - to get the feds and state to talk to each other.
It's hard to 50 states and a federal government to all talk to each other, so they came up with RealID to make state ID's all consistent and work like a national ID. If your current MA driver license is not RealID, you can blame the state for mismanaging their IT migration which was contracted out to be completed five years ago.
Except
We have a national ID. It's called a passport. It's just not mandatory to get one. But most people need some form of state ID for one reason or another (surprise surprise this also ties into needing an ID to vote!). So, this was the federal government's way to hook into that need and form a national database of information from state efforts because not everyone was getting a passport.
Oh, and our state tax dollars went to setting all of this up to meet a federal law. The Act was completely unfunded. So, thank Baker for going along with this stupidity instead of challenging it on a states' rights basis along with Minnesota and a few other states who actually put in state legislation that said they'd never go along with this.
Double the wait!
They post wait times on their website, but that is AFTER you get your ticket, the on eyou waited in line for an hour to get, so the wait time on the website is utterly useless.
FWIW they are listing time at 1:30 for registrations, and 1:15 for licensing.