WESTFIELD – Despite a press release from the Massachusetts Department of Transportation announcing that the “new public motor vehicle inspection system is operational today (Monday) across the Commonwealth and all service stations which completed their obligations for installing new equipment and participating in training for that equipment are now conducting public vehicle inspections,” service stations around the area were not open for inspections.
At Lecrenski Bros. in Russell, customers were told that no inspections were taking place, and that the problems were state-wide.
When asked about the problems, Judith Riley of the DOT responded by email. “The inspection network is up and running. Some station owners today have needed to be told how to enable the printing of stickers. They were taught this in training but the message is being repeated to them today and then they can enable stickers to print,” Riley wrote, adding, “Applus has a team of people available to answer calls and support the stations to remind them how to complete this step.” Applus is the new inspection contractor for the state.
However, when asked if printing stickers was the problem, a receptionist at Center City Auto said they couldn’t log into the machine with the code they were given, and were not able to reach the company by the phone number, which was busy all day. She said, statewide, people were having problems.
When reached on Tuesday, Nino Bruno, inspector at DeGray’s Service said they were still having issues with the cameras not working, which prevented them from performing inspections. Bruno said he left his phone number on Monday with the state to get back to him, but they never did. “Hopefully, I’ll get a hold of the state,” he said today. Bruno said a lot of places in the area were having issues.
