You may have noticed that I posted via twitter and a couple of flickr pics on Monday, my experience going to the Arizona Department of Transportation to become fully “Arizona-ized”. Dread had been filling me ever since I moved to Cottonwood 3.5 months ago.
Why the dread you ask? Mostly because I was coming from California, and if you live there, or have ever had the “pleasure” of going to the DMV there, you’ll immediately recognize that it can be quite the ordeal to deal with that bureaucratic behemoth which wallows in the worst customer service climate for any business or agency on the planet.
In all fairness, perhaps things have changed in the intervening 3 and a half months. Doubt it. The last time I visited a CA DMV (with an appointment, no less) my goals were to register a vehicle and title/register a trailer. With appointment it took me nearly 45 minutes to do what amounted to about 10 minutes worth of transactions.
Compare that with the recent experience at the AZ DOT/MVD where I registered a vehicle and got an AZ drivers license. The entire process took about 20 minutes (and here’s the kicker) I walked out of their building with my new drivers license in my wallet, the plates for my newly registered car, and the actual official, legal title for the car registered in AZ!
There is to be no waiting for any of that to be mailed to me 3 to whenever months from now. I won’t have to be disappointed when I see my picture on my new license (I was able to be disappointed immediately!) Actually, the image was very nicely exposed and I actually looked like I looked in that moment (my happiness about that is the story of another post, I’m sad to say 
)
I should have known the experience was to be a very different one when I read their mission statement they display (proudly, I hope) on their waiting area wall:
“Division to be a world class customer service organization”
Mission Statement:
To provide innovative products and services to meet the growing motor vehicle needs of the “New Arizona”
How have your experiences with motor vehicle departments been in your part of the country/world? We’d be especially interested to know what happens in other parts of the planet!
