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Question: Why does the city shut down the website where you can order license duplicates every weekend? Some of us are too busy during the week to get everything done and need to do it on the weekend.
Answer: Access is disrupted on Sundays although it’s not the city’s doing.
The “national AAMVA organization is currently going through Sunday (EST) maintenance for an undetermined length of time, thus our system cannot access or verify when the national program is down, which for us is all day Sundays,” said Sheri Kajiwara, director of the city Department of Customer Services. “So you are correct, the system seems to go down on Sundays because our connectivity to the national system is halted when they are under maintenance.”
Otherwise, you should be able to access the website, 808ne.ws/licdup, to order a duplicate Hawaii driver’s license or instruction permit originally issued by the City and County of Honolulu, she said. This website is not for commercial licenses, only standard ones.
After receiving complaints about the website being inaccessible on weekends, we emailed Kajiwara, who had the Department of Information Technology run tests. “Our DIT checked and believes our city system is running fine for online duplicates,” except for when the national maintenance halts operations on Sundays, she said.
As we have reported before, this is the website where eligible permit or license holders can order a duplicate to add the gold star, signifying compliance with the federal REAL ID law.
Read the directions carefully. To be eligible for Option 2 (addition of the gold star), applicants must have previously appeared in person to establish legal presence, between March 2014 through January 2018. During that period, strict ID verification requirements were in effect, but Hawaii didn’t offer the gold star as the stamp of approval.
The website also is where you can order a duplicate if your license is lost, stolen, destroyed or mutilated; in any of those cases, click on Option 1. You won’t get a gold star.
Q: What is the AAMVA?
A: The American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators is a private, nonprofit membership group that represents officials in the United States and Canada who administer and enforce motor vehicle laws, according to its website. Its members include representatives from all U.S. states and the District of Columbia.
The association was created in the 1930s with the idea of standardizing driver’s licensing and traffic laws, and continues to push for uniform requirements across the states and provinces. It publishes the technical standards for driver’s licenses compliant with the federal Real ID Act, commonly known as “gold star” licenses.
The AAMVA operates or supports databases that allow review of out-of-state records, such as the Commercial Driver’s License Information System (CDLIS), the Problem Driver Pointer System (PDPS) and the National Motor Vehicle Title Information System (NMVTIS).
Auwe
About one-third of the cars on my street, which is in a “nice neighborhood,” are both unregistered and have expired safety checks. I am “calling them in” one at a time. It is a safe bet that most of these also have no insurance, putting the rest of us at undue risk. — Reader
Mahalo
Big mahalo to a very kind lady in a black-and-white dress who graciously carried my lunch to a table at Iwilei Costco as I was carrying a cane and found it impossible to balance the multiple items. She also brought napkins and wished me well! I appreciate her cheerful kindness and thoughtfulness! May she be blessed many, many times, also! — Grateful senior shopper
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