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Businessmen jostle to register businesses in Hanoi
Many businessmen complain that at a time when the temperature has fallen to 10 degrees Celsius, they have to queue in front of the business registration agency in the chilling weather to register their business. The “one-stop-shop” mechanism, which has just been applied by the Hanoi Planning and Investment Department, is the main reason behind the situation.
Dan, an officer of a law firm in Hanoi, complained that during the last few days, he and his colleagues had to be present at the business registration office from 5 am to queue to submit business registration applications. “The temperature is always below 10 degrees Celsius, and it is really terrible to be outdoors at 5 am,” he said.
Duyen, an officer of a mobile phone distribution company said she spent the whole day January 12, 2011 cooling her heels at business registration office on Nguyen Chi Thanh street in order to ask for a certificate for the company’s address change.
Duyen related that she arrived at 10.03 am. However, she was told by the department’s officer that she had to return in the afternoon, because the department would have to serve other people who had arrived earlier. Learning from experience, Duyen came back to the department earlier in the afternoon at 1.00 pm, but she realized that many people came even earlier.
Duyen recalled that in October 2010, she once came to the department to for procedures on changing the company’s address. However, at that time, she did not have to wait and jostle in the crowd like this. “Since the one-stop-shop measure was applied, businesses have to spend more time on procedures,” she complained.
According to VnExpress, 30 people were seen standing in a long queue at 1.15 pm of January 12 in front of the business registration office on Nguyen Chi Thanh street. A lot of people were seen with newspapers and books in hands: they were reading to kill time while waiting.
More than one month ago, the Hanoi Planning and Investment Department began applying the one-stop-shop mechanism, putting new software into use. However, a lot of problems have arisen since the software and new procedures were applied. The department’s officers have been puzzled with how to update information, while businessmen have to waste time to queue up and submit documents.
“I have been told that previously, before the new software was applied, the business registration office could deal with 200 applications for business registration in a morning. Meanwhile, at present, they can accept 40 applications at maximum,” Dan said.
A young man, whom a VnExpress’ reporter met at the business registration office, said that the long queues have been happening for the last month. Every morning, when local residents are still sleeping, the business registration office is already noisy and crowded. People queue up for submitting applications for business registration. “The long queue reminds me of a scene from the subsidization period, when people had to queue to get vouchers for purchasing rice,” he said.
The man said that even if people come very early in the morning, they will still wait for the whole morning. It is because many “brokers” reserve seats in the long queues and then sell the reserved seats to other people for money.
Deputy Director of the Hanoi Planning and Investment Department Nguyen Van Tu admitted that people have to queue up to submit business registration applications.. “I understand the troublesome enterprises have to bear,” he said.
Tu said that when deciding to apply the one-stop-shop mechanism, state management agencies aim to simplify procedures and reduce inconveniences for businesses. However, due to the small number of officers, the new regulation is almost having the opposite effect. “Our officers themselves also have to work very hard, because they have a large volume of work to process,” he said.
“We are working out the solution with the Business Certificate Agency under the Ministry of Planning and Investment,” Tu added.
According to him, under the old process, the office in charge of granting business registration certificates only received applications and then updated information later. Meanwhile, with the new process, the office has to update information before receiving applications. Therefore, it takes more time to deal with applications.
“I had a meeting with officers on January 11. We have decided to assign more staff to do this work while waiting for new solutions,” he said.
vietnamnet, VnExpress
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