More NJ MVC offices open Tuesday. You probably shouldn’t go
After being closed for more than three months because of the COVID-19 pandemic, the New Jersey Motor Vehicle Commission partially reopened several offices last week, offering road testing and inspections.
MVC Chief Administrator Sue Fulton said beginning Tuesday at certain offices, the agency will begin doing first-time licensing and permits, out-of-state transfers, Real ID appointments for people whose previous appointments were put off, and renewals for drivers whose licenses expired more than three months ago.
MVC offices designated as vehicle centers will process registration and title transfers fgor private sales, other new registrations and license plate transactions.
Fulton said if you do go to an MVC agency office you will be required to wear a mask, and there will be markers on the ground prompting everyone to stay 6 feet apart. When you get to the reception desk, you'll be given a ticket for a queuing system, your cell number will be taken down and you'll get a text within 15 minutes of your number being called.
“You can run an errand,” Fulton said. “You can go to the shopping mall if it happens to be in a shopping mall space, or you can sit in your car, but it allows you to not be in that space with all those other people.”
Fulton said the idea very simply is to keep crowds from bunching together inside MVC agency offices.
“What we want to do is check you in, and then have you go somewhere else so that you’re not sitting there with a lot of other people," Fulton said.
She stressed you need to figure out in advance which agency office is offering which service, because “the vehicle centers are not going to be doing license transactions, the licensing centers are not going to be doing vehicle transactions — make sure you know when you’re coming in which is which.”
She also said the lines will be long.
Fulton said if drivers are able to do their transactions online they should not show up at agency offices, because they’ll be turned away.
She recommends double-checking to see when your license expired, because documents that expired in April have been extended three months, untill the end of July, so there may not be a need to rush into the MVC this week or next.
“There are some people who absolutely have to get their transaction done in person. We need to make room for them to do that,” she said.
To find out which agency office you should go to Fulton recommends visiting the MVC website.
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