Question: My wife and I went to get a driver’s license renewed at about 10 a.m. March 21 at the Koo­lau station. We had received a postcard in the mail telling us what items we had to bring. Nowhere did it ask whether you are married or divorced or say to bring in your marriage or divorce papers.

Nowhere on the walls did it say anything about marriage or divorce papers. We filled out the application and waited in line two hours only to find out we had everything we needed except marriage and divorce papers. Why weren’t we informed about that?

Answer: Hawaii’s Legal Presence Act, following through on requirements of the federal REAL ID Act, has been in effect since March 2012, and there was “a great effort” to make people aware of what was needed, said Sheri Kaji­wara, director of the city Department of Customer Services.

“For today’s customers, requirements are stated online (hidot.hawaii.gov/hawaiis-legal-presence-law),” she said, and “both the state and the city produced and distributed brochures.”

People whose name is different from the name on their legal-presence document because of marriage, divorce, adoption or another reason must provide a “connecting document” such as a government marriage certificate to establish the link between the names, the website says.

Although you said there was nothing posted on the walls, Kaji­wara said 36-inch informational posters are up at every driver’s licensing and state ID site, including Koo­lau.

“Attention is called to the fact that name differences must be addressed with additional documents,” she said.

That said, Kaji­wara acknowledged, “Yes, we should call attention to these requirements on the mailers, (and) we should make them a part of the application form you can download online. I am working to make both of these changes very soon.”

In February, Mayor Kirk Caldwell set up “triage” desks at licensing stations to make sure applicants had all the needed documents before standing in line, but one obviously was not available when you were at Koo­lau.

The city has hired part-time workers to help staff the desks when lines are long, including one assigned to Koo­lau, Kaji­wara said.

However, the site manager determines the part-timers’ start times, usually around the lunch hour when lines are longest, which may have accounted for the absence when you were there.

The manager also will work the line at other times, but because of spring break, lines have been longer than normal this week and last week, so she may have been helping out at the counter, Kaji­wara said.

SOME PAPERWORK IS UNACCEPTABLE

Kajiwara said an important key to improving service, minimizing transaction times and ultimately reducing wait lines is educating people on what documents are and are not accepted.

“Right now a large percent of transaction time is spent providing rationale, explaining federal government requirements and dealing with irate people who don’t have proper documents,” she said.

“We are now required to scan these documents into the system and cannot accommodate requests to ‘please let it slide this one time.’”

SHE laid out some important facts applicants should know:

>> A church-issued marriage certificate is ceremonial and not a government document. If the marriage occurred in Hawaii, you need to get a copy of the official certificate from the state Department of Health’s vital-records office. For out-of-state weddings, contact that jurisdiction’s vital-records office.

>> Engraved metal Social Security cards are not official and will not be accepted as proof of your Social Security number.

>> If your employer omits the first five digits of your Social Security number on your W-2 form for security reasons, you cannot use that W-2 form as proof of legal presence.

>> Although you could at one time request a cheaper “copy” of your birth certificate, without an embossed official seal, only certified copies with the official seal are accepted.

TOMORROW: MORE FRUSTRATION

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