DMV Misaddresses a Batch of Licenses

The Department of Motor Vehicles said Thursday it is replacing the mailing machine that recently sent up to 3,000 new driver’s licenses to the wrong addresses.

The machine, which sorts and mails more than 7 million driver’s license and identification cards each year, is 8 years old and was due to be replaced. The recent mishap only adds urgency to the need for replacement.

“It’s coming at an opportune time,” said DMV spokesman Steve Haskins.

The mistake is particularly embarrassing for the agency because the DMV announced new efforts last year to combat the growing problem of identity theft by ensuring that no licenses are mailed out without proper identification.

DMV officials promised they have flagged the computer records of the motorists who may have received the wrong driver’s licenses to reduce any chance of misuse.

For the next year, DMV officials will double-check the identity of any motorist who uses one of the missent licenses to report an accident or traffic violation or to request a change of records.

“We don’t think there is any major cause for concern,” said DMV spokesman Bill Branch.

Motorists whose driver’s licenses were sent to the wrong address can request a new license number. But the DMV warns that doing so will require motorists to change the number in all the records that use the old one.

The mistake happened when the mailing machine that matches licenses with addressed envelopes “slipped one notch” and got out of sync.

DMV officials are not certain how many licenses were incorrectly addressed. As of Thursday, they confirmed that 202 were missent, and said that number could go as high as 3,000. The erroneously mailed licenses were sent early this week, officials said.

Haskins said the new machine will be purchased in the next six months and “will be so sophisticated that if anything doesn’t match, the whole system stops.”

The DMV is asking everyone who received the wrong license to call (800) 777-0133 for information on how to return it.

The error comes as the DMV is in the midst of making partial license-fee refunds on as many as 26 million vehicles. The DMV is also refunding smog-impact fees on as many as 1.5 million vehicles after a court ruled that the levy was unconstitutional.

But the missent driver’s licenses were not the first such error by the state agency. The DMV recently sent a Los Angeles woman an envelope stuffed with the titles to about 50 new cars and trucks financed by General Motors Acceptance Corp.

The DMV blamed that mistake on an improperly folded title inserted in an envelope’s mailing-address window.