Bulgarian Interior Stirs More ID Issuing Confusion

Glitches in Siemens software for the new Bulgarian biometric IDs caused public outrage and forced people to line up for days in front of passport offices. Photo by BGNES

Bulgaria’s Interior Ministry created new large-scale confusion over the weekend after announcing the wrong bank account to pay the fees for the issuing of the new ID documents.

On Thursday, the Interior announced the passport offices will be open over the weekend in order to ease up the huge backlog and lines of people submitting applications. The announcement, however, warned citizens to pay the application fees on Friday since the bank branches, located inside the passport offices, will be closed. 3 bank accounts were listed, but one of them – of the Sofia Directorate of the Interior had been wrong.

The Interior had already fixed the mistake, however there is a strong possibility, some people have transferred money to the wrong account and are going to face unpleasant surprise Saturday and Sunday, especially given the fact, the Interior is now saying than bank branches, located inside the passport offices, will be open for business.

Following its launch on March 29, the new electronic system for issuing personal identity documents was overwhelmed by the number of users online and temporary and sporadic delays in servicing citizens’ needs occurred, with the Interior blaming mostly the German Siemens, which manufactured the software.

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