Ladies and gentlemen, welcome to this special briefing on the next critical steps in the upgrading of the DHA Live Capture system, which are a part of the broader effort of modernising all our systems at Home Affairs, for better service.

It is important to share for the benefit of our clients how this phase of the Smart ID Card system upgrade will impact on them and, with your help, to explain the civic duty on the part of each citizen to work with us in making this a smooth process as much as possible.

The current system upgrade of Live Capture facilities should be seen in the context of the department’s drive to improve processes for Smart ID card and passport applications. 

Accordingly, from 27 November 2015 until 2 December 2015, ID and passport services will not be available as the offices will be installing the new upgrades, for service improvement. Other services will be available. This applies only to the 140 Home Affairs Offices with the Live Capture system, those whose services include the issuing of Smart ID Cards (List is on Website).

During the upgrade, the affected offices will not be able to receive applications using the Live Capture system, from Friday, 27 November 2015, at 14h00, till 02 December 2015. For our staff, especially supervisors, this means working overtime on Sunday 29 November, for a successful upgrade and a speedy recovery to normal services as planned. Full services, as enhanced, should resume on 3 December 2015. Enhancements, favouring clients, include introducing:

•     A booking system on the e-channel, for people to apply for documents online, in the comfort of their homes or offices.
•     A re-enrolment process in terms of which there will be no need to recapture fingerprints within a specified period of re-application.

Our offices have already put up Public Notices to announce the system upgrade, and the affected services, To the clients. These innovations that should take us closer to creating a paperless environment, with all the benefits of e-government, are, above all else, for better service.

The last extensive system upgrade of the Live Capture facilities was in April, this year. The benefits to the clients included photo booth enhancements for improved queue management and improvements to systems we use to capture data of clients that cannot be done through normal processes, for babies and persons with disabilities or those who had lost limbs.

We appeal for patience, while apologISing in advance for the inconvenience these necessary changes would have caused to our clients.

You would help us to improve the services that we provide to you to the extent that you also discharge your civic responsibilities, in this case, by collecting passports, IDs and Smart Cards that you had applied for, and to please collect them at the office where you had applied, before 27 November 2015, to avoid last minute disappointment.

Messages would have been sent to the applicants whose documents are ready for collection, advising them to come and get their documents. Apart from the current systems upgrade, citizens have a duty to collect the documents that they had applied for; it is critical for securing citizenship and fighting, at all cost, identity fraud.

These are the total numbers of documents that have not been collected by the applicants:

•     Smart ID cards - 195 825
•     Green ID books – 75 517
•     Passports – 51 946

Lastly, I would like to reiterate the call to our people who had applied and had been informed that their IDs, Smart ID Cards and passports are available, to collect them before 27 November 2015 at the office where they had applied.

I wish you all a fulfilling festive season. Remember, in this period, to drive safe, and arrive alive.

I thank you!