Sakra Bima to expand despite criticisms

JAKARTA (JP): PT Sakra Bima Mandala, a private company handling the administration of payments for vehicle registration documents, has not been deterred by recent criticism of its monopoly of the service.

It plans to increase its service counters from 53 to 100 in Jakarta and has considered expanding its services nationwide.

"We hope that we'll have a total of 100 customer service units from the current 53 by next year," the company's president Bimo Pramudyo told reporters here yesterday.

PT Sakra Bima Mandala, whose chief commissioner is businessman Hutama Mandala Putra, also has plans to cooperate with Inkoppol, the police cooperatives, to expand its businesses throughout the country.

"The cooperation will make it easy to open the business in all the 27 provinces," Bimo said.

In the past few days, citizens and city legislators have voiced their worry that the company will take over the whole vehicle registration process, which is now handled by the police.

"The concern is baseless because what we do is to help process the payment procedure, not the registration process which is under police authority," Bimo said.

Several legislators have also questioned the legal basis of the cooperation between the government and the firm because the governor has not formally endorsed it.

According to Bimo, the company has no formal agreement with the municipality or with the police. "We only have cooperation with the banks," he said.

The firm has run the business since late 1993 with city-owned Bank DKI. It then expanded its network services late last week with the signing of a cooperation with another seven private banks.

The firm has a total of 53 customer service units at the eight banks and at their branch offices around the city to help process the payment of vehicle documents in Jakarta, Tangerang, Bekasi and Depok.

"If we have been lousy in running this business, why has the public dared to expand it?" Bima asked. "Since 1993, we have received no public complaints about our services."

In return for their service, applicants have to pay about Rp 10,000 (US$4.50) for the payment processing of motorcycle registration documents and about Rp 20,000 for car registration documents, depending on the type and model.

National Police spokesman Brig. Gen. I. Ketut Ratta warned on Tuesday that the police would not hesitate to review the existence of the firm if the company failed to meet the public's expectations.

The company executives claim that the primary aim of their operation is to increase the "comfort" of vehicle owners attending to registration documents.

Previously, vehicle owners have had to jostle in small, crowded rooms at the joint police-city administrative offices, one of which is in East Jakarta, while the other is at the city police headquarters. (bsr)