Business Reporter
The Zimbabwe National Road Administration (Zinara) has digitised vehicle licensing and motorists can now renew their discs in the comfort of their homes as the administration moves to bring convenience to the motoring public.

Following the introduction of the online vehicle licensing, visiting Zinara offices or those of its agents, is now a matter of choice as this can be done from home.

Zinara has partnered several agents to roll-out the online vehicle licensing platform and some of the agents can deliver the discs to motorists at their homes.

Zinara public relations manager Mr Tendai Mugabe, said the move was aimed at bringing convenience to motorists and also to avoid congesting licensing sites as a way of fighting Covid-19.

“This is one of the innovations that we have come up with to bring convenience to the motoring public,” said Mr Mugabe.

“We are saying there is no reason why motorists should spend production time queuing to buy a vehicle license. They can now do this in the comfort of their homes and we believe that to a greater extend this also helps to fight Covid-19 since health experts are discouraging huge public gatherings.”

Some of the agents that had partnered Zinara to offer online vehicle licensing services, include FBC, Econet Wireless, Champion Insurance and Zimnat among others.

“We also have the GeneInsure automated self-service vehicle licensing machine, which operates like an automated teller machine.

“This is a self-service machine, where one can license their car in supermarkets, Zinara offices and the same machines are also being introduced at tollgates as a way of bringing convenience to motorists,” said Mr Mugabe.

He said Zinara was moving with modern trends and has also introduced a pre-paid tolling card that works offline.

Mr Mugabe said the pre-paid tolling card could be used by both individual motorists and corporates and it comes in handy when cash is not available or when banks systems are off line.

“The biggest advantage of using the pre-paid tolling card is that it does not have transactional costs and it can work offline,” said Mr Mugabe.

“This means that you cannot be delayed at tollgates even if the network is down and you are not charged anything for paying toll fees using the card.”

Mr Mugabe said the pre-paid tolling card would go a long way in reducing congestion at the tollgates.

Assuming the card got scratched and is malfunctioning, Mr Mugabe said a motorist could get a replacement with full balance in the old card at the back office of any tollgate.

He said the pre-paid tolling card also reduced chances of corruption at tollgates as handling of hard cash would be minimised.

One can use a pre-paid tolling card once it is credited with a minimum of $50.

The Covid-19, declared a global health pandemic by the World Health Organisation, has seen many companies adopting a new normal of conducting business off station to minimise human to human interaction.