The Land Transportation Office (LTO) denied that it will terminate the contract with Dermalog, the service provider of the agency’s new online platform, Land Transportation Management System (LTMS).
In a statement released on Friday night, March 15, LTO chief Assistant Secretary Vigor D. Mendoza II said the agency is more focused on solving all the challenges in the agency in order to deliver fast and convenient services to its clients across the country.
“Our hands are full in terms of further improving our services and in delivering what needs to be delivered to our kababayan. All of these are our priority right now,” said Mendoza.
Mendoza said these priorities include the continuous efforts to go on a full digital shift in all transactions such as driver’s license and motor vehicle registration.
He said the full digitalization is one of his priorities and within six months of his term of office, the utilization rate of the LTMS was improved to 97 percent from only around 70 percent when he took over the top LTO post.
The LTMS was a product of the award by the national government in 2018 to the Joint Venture Agreement of German company Dermalog and its local partners as part of the full digitalization efforts of all the transactions in the LTO.
While some lawmakers, through House of Representatives hearings, raised some issues on the contract, Dermalog earlier said that it emerged excellent in its performance at the LTO.
Amid allegations of underperformance, Dermalog said around 28 million driver’s licenses were processed under the LTMS since it was used in the LTO, which it said, translates to 30,000 processing and issuances per day.
On motor vehicle registration, it said the LTMS is processing 70,000 to 80,000 per day since it was tapped to register new motor vehicles and in their registration renewal.
As a result, it said LTO clients saved around P1.9 billion in computer fees and for driver’s license transactions and another more than P3 billion for computer fees in motor vehicle registration.