Abu Dhabi: Officials have instructed national ID card applicants to furnish proper contact details in the application form and collect the cards within one month from post offices.
The warning comes as 40,000 cards have not been collected from post offices across the country, some even 90 days after issuance. Those cards will be returned to the Emirates Identity Authority and applicants will not be able to collect them anymore, Dr. Ali Al Khoury, Director General of Emirates Identity Authority, told Gulf News on Wednesday.
He called on customers to pick up their cards within 30 days from the date of notification. Al Khoury was speaking on the sidelines of an event in Abu Dhabi Wednesday, where the Emirates Identity Authority and Emirates Post signed a service agreement to upgrade services.
Abdullah Al Ashram, CEO of Emirates Post, and Mohammad Al Mazroui, Executive Director of the Population Register, Emirates Identity Authority signed the agreement.
As per the agreement, Emirates Post will receive ID cards from Emirates Identity Authority daily, and will subsequently send SMS in Arabic or English (as per customer's nationality) to customers in less than 48 hours, asking them to pick up their cards from a post office or private post boxes.
Emirates Post should provide weekly and monthly reports on the delivered and returned cards, and the reasons and date of the return. Emirates Post should also provide proof that it has communicated with the customer more than once, asking him/her to pick up the card.
The agreement also stipulates that lost ID cards or cards sent to the wrong person should not exceed 0.1 per cent of the total cards annually delivered by Emirates Identity Authority to Emirates Post. Customers' complaints about Emirates Post's services should not exceed 1 per cent of the overall cards delivered monthly.
Also, signboards should be placed inside the Emirates Post centres illustrating where to collect ID cards.
Out of more than 2.69 million cards delivered to Emirates Post since February 2011, more than 1.8 million ID cards have been handed over to owners, Al Mazroui said. Of this, 337,000 cards were delivered to owners via private post boxes since mid-September 2011.
Al Ashram said Emirates Post distributes around 12,000 cards per day and the number is increasing constantly. About 92 per cent of customers pick up their ID cards within 14 days after notification, including 40 per cent who pick their cards within two days.
He indicated that the Emirates Post head office in Abu Dhabi had experienced a system breakdown last week. Emirates Post has, however, taken necessary measures to prevent such breakdowns in future.
Delivery glitches
A temporary delay may be experienced in the delivery of ID cards registered in November and December due to shifting of printing operations to Mussaffah, a senior official said.
These cards are expected to be delivered within a few weeks due to the rapid rise in the number of ID card registration across the UAE, Mohammad Al Mazroui, Executive Director of the Population Register at the Emirates Identity Authority, said. He said more than 30,000 cards are printed daily.
The printing centre works 24 hours a day during the week.
