What does the Ministry of Transport say about imported car inspection?

However, the Ministry of Transport has denied this information. Accordingly, Mr. Tran Quang Ha, Deputy Director of the Department of Science and Technology (Ministry of Transport) said that this information is incorrect.

Specifically, according to Mr. Ha, regarding the testing period, Circular 03 of the Ministry of Transport has guided (regulated) the exemption of a number of conditions in the inspection and testing process for imported vehicles compared to domestically produced vehicles (domestic produced vehicles must test all 7 components).

Imported vehicles only test representative sample vehicles of the imported batch and do not have to test accompanying components such as: tires, mirrors, glass, lighting, fireproof interior materials (these component papers only need to present certificates); do not have to test the evaporation test in the emission test, so the time and cost are much reduced compared to testing samples and certifying the type of domestically assembled vehicles.

Car emission testing costs thousands of dollars per imported car batch is unfounded.

According to the procedure for import inspection: after the inspection agency randomly takes samples from the imported vehicle batch (there may be 2 samples to test both emissions and safety at the same time), the enterprise brings the vehicle to the testing facility. The time and cost for a vehicle sample to be tested are as follows:

For emission testing, from the time the testing facility receives the sample vehicle until the results are returned, it takes no more than 2 days. The testing cost is 27 million/sample (for gasoline engines) and 28 million for diesel engines).

Regarding safety testing, the testing facility receives sample vehicles for testing and returns the vehicles on the same day and the test report is issued the following day (if the enterprise provides sufficient technical documents on the sample vehicle). The testing cost is 12 million/test sample.

“Therefore, the idea that testing a car model can take up to 6-8 weeks (not including the time for submitting documents, checking the car, and issuing certificates - which takes about half a month) and costs up to 10,000 USD for emissions testing” is unfounded,” Mr. Ha emphasized.

According to Mr. Ha, with a market capacity of 300,000 vehicles/year, import businesses cannot import small batches of goods, as each imported batch must contain at least hundreds of vehicles.

Therefore, taking a sample of the imported vehicle for emission and safety testing does not incur significant costs for the importing enterprise. If the importers are really economical in the process, the above testing cost is about 40 million VND (equivalent to nearly 2,000 USD).

Decree 116 of the Government was issued to implement the Investment Law, aiming to implement the Strategy for the development of the Vietnamese automobile industry to 2025, with a vision to 2035 according to Decision No. 1168/QD-TTg dated July 16, 2014 of the Prime Minister, which requires ensuring equality in quality management of imported vehicles with domestically produced vehicles, creating conditions for domestic enterprises to invest, expand production, and ensure vehicle safety quality.

Currently, the Ministry of Transport has confirmed that three enterprises, Ford Vietnam Company, Honda Company, and Truong Hai Company, are actively working with partners in exporting countries to complete procedures related to Type Approval Certificates and import cars to Vietnam (from the Thai and US markets) in accordance with the provisions of Decree 116.