Representative image of cars parked in Bengaluru.
Credit: DH Photo/Janardhan B K
Bengaluru: A glitch in the state transport department's website brought vehicle registrations across Karnataka to a grinding halt for the last three days, inconveniencing dealers and throwing a spanner in customers' festival plans.
The Transport Department's website has been inaccessible since Monday due to the expiry of the server security certificate. On Thursday, some were able to access the website but couldn't get through the payment portal, leading to incomplete registrations.
This has, possibly, led to a backlog of several thousand vehicle registrations and deliveries across the state.
"Many of our customers were very disappointed because they wanted their vehicles during this auspicious period for purchases," Prabhu T M from Bangalore Wheels, a Yamaha dealer in the city, told DH. "However, dealers cannot deliver vehicles without registration because we cannot risk any problems that may arise once sold as they will still be registered under the dealership."
Prabhu said that this has hit their festive sales. "On average, we sell at least 15 vehicles per day. But since Sunday, there has been a backlog of 50 vehicle registrations; at least 10% of our customers have cancelled their bookings," he said.
A senior manager from a popular car dealership in Bengaluru explained that there has been a possible backlog of over 2,000 vehicle registrations across the state.
"Every day, at least 750 vehicles are registered across dealerships across the state, 500 of which are cars. This has caused inconvenience to customers because everything came to a standstill," he told DH.
Transport Commissioner Yogeesh A M told DH that the department was notified about the expiration of the website's server security certificate on Monday.
"The vendor to whom this has been outsourced was on leave for Deepavali, so this has taken some time. We have been working on this from 9 am and it will be fixed by this evening," he said.
A senior officer from the department blamed the problem to a lack of communication from the treasury or vendor about the expiry of the certificate. He said that the department has been working out the formalities with their certified vendors.
"Once we get it, we will forward it to the National Informatics Centre in New Delhi, who will enable (the website) and the payments will start," he said.