The move is in line with the DVLA’s 2014-15 business plan, which aimed to “accelerate and expand digital transformation” in order to “reform” the government service provider and “improve customer service”.
The success of the DVLA initiative is key to the Government Digital Service’s (GDS’s) 2012 digital strategy. GDS chose 25 significant ‘exemplar’ services — of which the Vehicle Management service is one — to rebuild and redesign as digital services for public use by the first quarter of 2015.
DVLA aims to launch a public beta intended at the end of the year, and the Agency’s objective, according to its 2014-15 business plan, is to have the Vehicle management service available to the public by March 2015.
The process of telling the DVLA that a used car has been bought or sold is currently paper-based — involving the filling in of a slip on the logbook and sending it off to the DVLA — and takes several weeks.
With the digital service, these changes will be updated with the DVLA on the same day that they are made.
Users of the service will also be able to inform the DVLA of the death of an owner and record personalised number-plates.