MACDILL AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. -- Tired of being stuck in line for hours, waiting to renew that old ID card? Well, thankfully the MacDill Air Force Base, 6th Force Support Squadron has a solution!
Due to COVID-19, The Office of the Secretary of Defense issued a policy, which allowed military dependent and retiree ID cards expiring on January 1, 2020, to be valid until June 30, 2021. With that date quickly approaching, it’s no wonder that there were over 53,000 searches for “MacDill ID card” on Google in the month of February.
“As much as we would love to provide service to each and every single customer that comes into the Military Personnel Flight, there is only so much that we can do due to COVID precautions,” said Airman 1st Class Mariell Doria, a customer support technician with the 6th FSS. “We are trying to keep ourselves and the customer’s safe while also trying to come up with even better solutions to help out more customers.”
The 6th FSS implemented two new ID card kiosks: one located inside the Moffitt Visitor Center just outside the main gate, and the other by the food court inside the Base Exchange. They’re available for retirees and dependents to renew their ID cards.
The kiosks can help reduce the amount of people visiting the ID card building.
“With 50,000 annual visitors to our MPF facility, our main goal with this program is to provide options to our customers.” said Capt. Ryan Bullard, the MPF commander.
“Members scan their documents, take a picture and send all required information to our MPF who, in turn, make the ID card and contact the member for pick-up,” mentioned Bullard. The cards also have a 14-day guarantee to be made and be ready for pick-up.
Have your sponsor submit DD Form 1172-2 to the Defense Manpower Data Center before visiting the kiosk. Bring 2 forms of ID, fill out the form, scan your documents, take a photo and hit submit.
“We’re in the beginning phases of this new program, but we expect once utilized to its full extent, it will reduce the traffic to our MPF facility” said Bullard.
Bullard added that the MPF is analyzing the utility rates of the kiosks and if deemed effective, they will add more around MacDill.