Private Motor Vehicle Inspection Center (PMVIC) owners on Feb. 11 heeded the call of Department of Transportation (DOTr) Secretary Arthur Tugade to lower their current inspection fees for private vehicles from P1,500-P1,800, to P600 while there is a pandemic.
Despite lowered fees, the process will still cover all 73 inspection items, including smoke emission, for a comprehensive test of a vehicle’s roadworthiness.
Meanwhile, the inspection fee for motorcycles will also be lowered to P500 and P300 for public utility jeepneys.
PMVICs also agreed to waive re-inspection fees for private and public utility vehicles (PUVs) for one year.
The lowering of testing fees for vehicle inspection, a requisite to vehicle registration with the agency, will be effective immediately, Land Transportation Office (LTO) Assistant Secretary Edgar Galvante.
After long negotiations and discussions, Secretary Tugade was able to convince Motor Vehicle Inspection Center Owners to charge fees at par with Private Emission Testing Centers, Assistant Secretary for Procurement and Project Implementation and concurrent Chief of Staff Giovanni Lopez announced in yesterday's virtual press conference.
Earlier, the DOTr Secretary issued an appeal to lower the PMVIC fees to strike a balance between keeping the roads safe and considering the financial difficulties of vehicle owners at due to the pandemic.
“In the same way that we responded to the call of the government about roadworthiness and made the investment without hesitation, we believe that this is a good and worthy program," says President of Vehicle Inspection Center Owners Association of the Philippines (VICOAP) Iñigo Larrazabal.
"In this case, in the time of pandemic that we agreed to lower our fees, we will still have to perform our mandate. And this is beyond getting paid," he reasoned. "We take our advocacy of road worthiness seriously."
At the same time, “Our life-threatening problems on respiratory and cardiovascular diseases due to unabated motor vehicle emissions and the needless Filipino deaths yearly due to road accidents, crashes and the equally urgent global problem on climate change cannot wait to be addressed anymore," warned President of Clean Air Philippines Movement Inc. Dr. Leo Olarte.
"Like COVID-19, it is also an emergency that we all need to address,” he concluded.