Inspection of 187 Private Vehicle Inspection Centers Suspected of Fraudulent Testing... 25 Suspended

Ministry of Land and Environment's Special Inspection Finds Data Manipulation and Test Omissions at 25 Sites
Strengthening Supervision to Eradicate Poor Inspections Through Continuous Detection System and Consulting

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On the 23rd, the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport announced that, in a joint special inspection with the Ministry of Environment and local governments, 25 out of 187 suspected cases of fraudulent inspections were detected among more than 1,800 designated automobile maintenance businesses (private inspection centers) nationwide.

The government and local governments have been conducting joint inspections of private automobile inspection centers once a year since the second half of 2017, and twice a year since 2018, to eradicate illegal and substandard inspections, ensure vehicle safety, and protect the air environment.

This joint inspection was conducted from the 5th to the 25th of last month nationwide simultaneously by forming five inspection teams to eradicate substandard inspections such as tolerating illegal tuning, falsifying inspection results, and partially omitting inspection items at some private inspection centers.

The inspection targets were selected from 187 locations by analyzing inspection information of private inspection centers in the automobile inspection management system, focusing on companies with excessively high pass rates, those frequently receiving complaints, and those with significantly high cargo vehicle inspection rates suspected of fraudulent inspections.

As a result of the inspection, violations were detected at 25 locations, accounting for 13.4% of the inspection targets.

The main violations were partial omission of inspection items such as exterior inspections, with 11 cases (44%) being the most frequent. This was followed by inadequate recording of inspection scenes and results with 9 cases (36%), violations of equipment precision maintenance with 3 cases (12%), and one case each (8%) of substandard facilities and equipment standards and failure to issue inspection result sheets, among other poor inspection result measures.

The 25 private inspection centers found to be in violation will be subject to administrative sanctions by the relevant local governments, including suspension of operations for 10 to 30 days (25 locations) and suspension of duties (25 individuals), depending on the nature of the violations.

By type of inspection center, regular inspection centers (14.4%) showed a slightly higher violation rate than comprehensive inspection centers (12.7%). Regionally, Gwangju, Chungnam, Gangwon, and Jeonbuk areas had relatively more cases than other regions. For 65 inspection centers in eight local governments including Seoul, Busan, and Daegu, where the violation rate was 0%, continuous on-site inspections will be maintained.

Park Ji-hong, Director of Automobile Policy at the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport, stated, "To eradicate fraudulent inspections, we will strengthen management by continuously conducting joint inspections in consultation with related agencies such as the Ministry of Environment and local governments."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.