Fair enough, but their prices to take said photographs were an utter rip off, so karma and all that.

Aoife. The Maths don’t add up. 600,000
licences every year appears rather a large number even allowing for lost licences and provisional ones. But even at that number Mr Foley says 4000 people rely on it for their business. That’s 150 customers per year per service provider. I thinks he is exaggerating quite a bit.

Is it April fools day? For feck sake it’s the digital age – adapt or die lads

600,000 licences issued every year in Ireland? Really? And they last 10 years?
So, approx 6,000,000 have Irish drivers licences..

That’d be about right. Yeah.

Ah now, this is hardly a massive monopolist new state invention, sure you still have the passports lads, not to mention, Garda Id, student cards and of course weddings. Good luck!

There are so many other reasons people have I.D photos taken. This will not take a huge chunk of business away. From working in photo developing myself, it is the fault of greedy shop owners who price these photos so high-that is why they would be losing out. Seriously €6 and upwards for one photograph containing 4 or 6 small images!! Takes less than 1 minute to put through and print!! I often reccomend that people take their own photo at home, They can brighten it up themselves at the kiosk and print it as a regular photo for 40c.

600,000 licences each year? Am I the only person who thinks that figures is a bit high, even including renewals.

So now i have to go to a specific office at a designated time to get a photo and renew my licence instead of doing it online or by post. So much for moving forward.

I took and printed my own photos for my passport and driving license. It only cost me a few cent to do so. That way I could avoid expensive photo booths and chemists, and take a better picture, …look less like a muppit.

How much will the new system cost me? Bet they’re going to charge me €10 to sit in front of their camera, well it’s going to be a monopoly.

Let’s not change anything ever, for fear that someone will have to retrain.

Anyway, generally we’re talking one photo every ten years for each driver, how many people are depending on that income?

Passports are big users of these so don’t see a big issue.. let them downsize in preparation for fully electronic passports.

What decade is this?

Everyone I know has access to a digital camera. If you could upload your own jpegs, all the cropping and resizing and background lightening and ensuring the hairline is between lines D and E could be done automatically, in software. And if you can’t get a reasonable biometric scan off it, it can be rejected instantly. You then get a link for a Garda to certify. No printing, no scanning, no messing about with stupid little photos.

Does Ireland do this? No it doesn’t. Instead it creates a tender where the only two options are scanning and having someone else take short range photos to make your nose look bigger.

The real story is why Leo has to put this process to tender in the first place when the jobs could be used to transfer public servants into jobs that are useful, using the motor tax offices to process the photos……Instead he hands what is sure to be an over priced job to a company registered in geneva, switzerland……The board of executives look like they could use the money though….to think that photography stores would collapse due to the loss of passport id’s is ridiculous and frankly a non story.

i go to the booth outside the door of motor vehicles,, thought everyone did,, passports now thats a different story, back grounds, ears showing,, size,, sorry photographers but ye are a little costly,,, watch our pennies now

imagine the Qs for this service! Anything to do with motoring is done the same, walk in, press for ticket, wait 2 hours for one of the 6 or 7 booths to come available.. and to top it, i can bet that the photo service will be more expensive than a chemist or photo shop! its just another money making scam by government.

Look, when the motor car ‘came in’ a lot of horse dealers went to the wall. What’s their point, exactly?

It’s almost impossible to know where to start …

Passport photos, are verified by someone who knows the person involved or is a Guard. The same process could be used. Even then if the applicant has to come into an office they will be standing in front of the employee working for the firm. The employee can then use a process called “looking” to see if it’s the same person as in the photo.

You know every once in a while someone goes “Oh, yeah, we’re like a laughing stock.”? Well this sort of thing doesn’t help.

Is this the same SGS that operate the NCT centres? The other point is will this have an effect on local authority jobs if they are no longer issuing the licenses?

Digital cameras have been out for about 10 years and white walls are a plenty. If anyone is still paying someone to get a mug shot done then they truly are a mug.

About time hopefully this will stop fake licences, and will also be an identity for the the upholders of the law

Technology. Get over it.

This is crazy. Are we that stuck for proper news?

There’s argument for and against here. The thing that sticks out for me is that it is going to be a monopoly situation with the issue of drivers licences. What’ll they cost I wonder ? With no competition it could be the case that whatever you paid for your photo becomes a pittance compared to the new overall cost of getting a licence. Everyone needs to make a living and having to pay €5 or €10 once every 10 years is very good value in my opinion. At least you’d be sure the photo was in the correct format and dimensions etc. and you wouldn’t have had it thrown back at you. Honestly, the way people jump on the “rip of Ireland” bandwagon is astounding sometimes. At the first sign of a potential opportunity the phrase “rip off Ireland” is thrown out by someone. Give it a rest will ya ? Fact is that Ireland is an expensive country, and by the very definition of “rip off Ireland” the people often accused of being rip off merchants get ripped of too, don’t they ?

I’ve been taking my own photos for years and when I read the headline on this I thought they were moving to an online application and allowing people to upload their photos. But no, that would be moving forward. Instead I’m going to have to go in person to an office at least 20 miles away and queue so some Muppet can take a mugshot that makes me look like a criminal. Who thinks up these things?

The Irish say yes to everything the Government do. Yes to Austerity, Yes to state control over children and families. Yes Sir, Yes Sir, 3 bags full Sir. Pathetic country.

The cost of a driver’s licence from 1 January 2013 is €55 for a ten year licence. Previously it was €25. Surely if its going towards an automated system, it should be more cost effective, why a €30 increase!

It is about time we have good driving licence the other ones get damaged in your wallet the new one will not, and I presume their will be more information about the licence holders on the new licence which is good, this will roughly be the same the same size as a a bank card, as for the people that were taking the photos for the old ones it was a rip off, time to move on

Every year when the price of a licence goes up just like our motorways I’m sure everyone will be wandering how did this happen?
All the problems in the country and a fiver every 10 years is a problem.
What else could our government put up for tender, maybe use all our houses for holiday homes to increase tourism