The launch of the computerised MOT system has been
marred by complaints from the motor industry that they have been
left in the dark over system failures.
Built by Siemens Business Services as part of a private finance
initiative, the £220m computerised testing system allows garage
staff to record MOT results on terminals linked to a central
mainframe.
The roll out of the system to more than 18,000 vehicle testing
stations in the UK commenced on 18 April 2005 and was completed on
31 March this year. It was officially launched last Friday. More
than 16 million tests have been successfully recorded on the
system, Siemens said.
However, Ian Davis Knight, head of the Retail Motor Industry
Federation's (RMIF) MOT Technical Operations Team, said MOT garages
had been kept in the dark about poor system performance. "Immediate
steps must be taken to improve the new system and associated
support procedures before customer and trade confidence hits rock
bottom," he said.
Davis Knight added that two partial collapses of the system in
two weeks in March had left many MOT testing stations unable to
perform tests, causing considerable loss to their businesses and
inconvenience to their customers.
A Siemens spokesman said, "A great deal of effort went into
resolving such difficulties as they occurred and, in a relatively
short space of time, things settled down and positive feedback was
received from users."
The government's Vehicle and Operator Services Agency (Vosa) has
told the RMIF that the number of stations affected was minimal on
each occasion, but this did not tally with the large number of
calls the federation had received from its members, Davis Knight
said. The RMIF is now surveying its members on the issue.
Siemens has established two mainframe systems in Blackpool which
hold the central database. Vehicle testing stations and Vosa are
connected to this central database, which holds vehicle
information, test results and details of authorised examiners and
testers in a smart-card-secured system.