Since 2019, the Ohio governor’s office and Bureau of Motor Vehicles (BMV) have worked to expand online options for Ohio drivers, with a goal of providing increased convenience and a more positive BMV experience overall. This initiative has resulted in two services that have saved customers more than 1 million trips to the BMV, says Ohio BMV Registrar Charlie Norman: online driver knowledge testing and BMV Express self-service kiosks.

Meeting Customers Where They Are

Getting to motor vehicle offices during business hours can be tricky for some people. And after the pandemic, many agencies realized that, in addition to in-office services, providing online services and other convenient ways to meet their customers was the way forward, says JR Haglund, director of Sales at Neumo (formerly Intellectual Technology, Inc.), which provides on-demand software to motor vehicle agencies.

This initiative has resulted in two services that have saved customers more than 1 million trips to the BMV.

Partnering with the Ohio BMV, they rolled out BMV Express self-service kiosks in 2021, with locations in grocery stores, emissions stations and outside BMV offices. Ohioans can renew their vehicle registrations at the kiosks, with registration cards and license plate stickers printed on the spot.

Whether a night-shift worker needs to renew in the early morning after work or a single parent decides to renew during their regular grocery trip, drivers can visit the kiosks at their convenience. To meet the diverse needs of BMV customers, kiosks are also multilingual and set up across the state, including in more rural areas. Norman notes that, so far, there have been more than 700,000 transactions completed at the 58 kiosks.

Implementing Online Testing

Following this success, the Ohio BMV and Neumo introduced online driver knowledge testing in 2022. Drivers can take the test online at their convenience and receive a temporary permit after they pass. This can be especially helpful for drivers who initially fail the test, as they don’t have to make recurring trips to a BMV office.

Implementing online testing wasn’t without its challenges, but it proved to be a valuable learning opportunity for Neumo and a big success for the BMV and its customers.

“With Ohio being one of the first states to implement online driver knowledge testing, there were some parts where we grew and learned through the process, and a lot of that had to do with security,” Haglund says. To discourage cheating, the program needs to capture pictures of the driver randomly and compares them throughout the test, so Neumo initially had rigid parameters for what was considered an authorized photo. However, that led to some tests being disqualified that shouldn’t have been.

“Maybe the person sneezed or rubbed their face, which would get flagged,” Haglund says. “We were able to adjust the parameters so that the test wasn’t disqualifying people who shouldn’t be disqualified. But it was still able to capture whether someone was cheating and disqualify them appropriately.”

To date, more than 650,000 tests have been taken online.

Looking Toward the Future

Altogether, these services have dramatically reduced lines and wait times at BMV offices, says Norman, which is particularly beneficial for those who need to visit an office or who still like to complete all their BMV business in person. In fact, feedback about the kiosks has been so positive that the Ohio BMV and Neumo are working to expand the number of kiosks available, as well as the services they can provide.

“We’re giving people back the most valuable commodity: their time,” Norman says. “I feel really good about being able to do that through these services.”