Texas DPS driver’s license offices to reopen Monday after system outage

The Texas Department of Public Safety’s (DPS) Driver License Offices will reopen for regular business hours statewide on Monday, Sept. 11.

The reopening comes after the offices were closed for several days following a system outage. Online services will also be available.

“Over the Labor Day weekend, the Driver License Division began upgrading the DL system as part of its State-to-State (S2S) implementation plan. All offices closed on Friday, Sept. 1, and were scheduled to reopen on Tuesday, Sept. 5. However, despite prior testing, a capacity issue caused by the upgrade overloaded the system and services became unavailable,” DPS said.

DPS worked to identify a variety of issues with the software and amount of traffic brought on by the upgrade. They addressed the issues to stabilize the system and slowly increased driver license transactions each day. Employees remained stationed at offices throughout the week to accommodate walk-in customers whenever possible and on Friday, select Mega Center reopened in North Texas.

“We understand the frustration the extended upgrade has caused to those customers who had their appointments cancelled this week, and we apologize for the inconvenience. Our customer service team is contacting impacted Texans via preferred email or phone to give them priority rebooking as quickly as possible,” DPS said.

DL offices will be extending hours in high-volume areas in order to accommodate rebooked appointments in the short-term. During this time, walk-in service will be very limited or unavailable at most locations as they work to serve people who were impacted this week.

Anyone who had an appointment that was cancelled Sept. 5-8 and has not yet been rebooked is asked to email CUSTOMERSERVICEDL@dps.texas.gov and include your name and preferred DL office for assistance.

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The Texas Department of Public Safety announced that appointments scheduled for Friday are canceled at most locations due to an ongoing outage impacting the driver’s license system.

“Man I’m trying to get on the road, but I’m on hold right now, can’t get on the road when I’m on hold,” a customer who identified himself as the Houston song lyricist, “JungleBoy,” said.

All services, including renewing and replacing a driver’s license or ID card and driver records have been impacted.

The only locations that are open during regular business hours will be the Garland Mega Center, Fort Worth Mega Center, and Carrollton Mega Center.

Customers are being notified of their appointment cancellation.

The department said they are working to identify the issue related to the driver’s license system update. No security issues have been reported.