The Land Transportation Office banked off the additional requirements of an NBI clearance to get a professional driver’s license.

LTO-Tagbilaran Registrar Erwin Patalinghug explained though that police clearance is still needed to get professional driver’s license (PDL) and for change classification from non-professional driver’s license to PDL.

A court clearance would also suffice, according to Patalinghug.

However, an NBI clearance will be considered in lieu of a police clearance, he added.

For student permit, applicants still need to present birth certificates issued by the National Statistics Office and a medical certificate.

In its administrative order dated November 25, 2015, LTO chief Alfonso Tan Jr. issued an administrative, signed by Transportation and Communications Secretary Joseph Emilio Abaya, suspended the requirement to submit an NBI clearance.

The order, in effect, suspends of Administrative Order No. AVT-2015-29 came ‘in view of the non-availability of NBI offices in far flung areas and island provinces’ as earlier reported.

It was clarified by LTO-national office that ‘applicants for new professional licenses will still need to submit such clearance, a requirement that has been in place since before’.

The NBI clearance is no longer required only ‘for conductor’s license and subsequent transactions after the issuance of professional driver’s license such as renewal and additional restriction codes’ and that the ‘old policy requiring police or NBI clearances for new PDL or change classification from non-professional driver’s license to PDL shall remain in force’, according to the November 25 order.

There is a plan, though, to scrap the administrative order after the suspension.

For the meantime, the LTO finds ‘more time to evaluate its controversial sections’.

The requirement of NBI clearance and police clearance met objections from motorists, citing the inconvenience of getting the additional requirements.

It had also been proposed at the Senate that LTO should better have a negative list wherein it is the LTO that will just access the NBI and police records of applicants upon applying for driver’s licenses through their system in the computer.

This is to an applicant for driver’s license the cost and time in getting NBI clearance and police clearance.