New Texas Car Registration Site Is A Portal To Hell

I just renewed my wife's vehicle the old way not long ago. It was clean, simple, and effective. The new way is a nightmare slog through bureaucratic and computer/smartphone hell.

When I went to register my second vehicle yesterday a new system was in place and it was not fun.

I hope I can remember all of this, but it was a LOT!.  The new process is called TxT.  Here's the official synopsis:

TxT is an official, account-based digital government assistant that provides an even easier, faster, and more secure way for Texans to take care of government services – like vehicle registration renewal

Um, horse patties it is.  I'm sure it'll be easier the next time, but for a guy that works with computers all day, it was an overly-complicated, intrusive, waste of time. As part of the process, and linking my license (which I'm not sure you have to do or not, because it's not very clear) I had to get TWO confirmation emails and enter the codes, then to include my phone I had to have a confirmation number on that as well. Oh, I also had to provide answers to three security questions, create passwords, open six emails, and on and on. Finally,

I had to then enter a credit card and I got this darling graphic:

I'm sure they thought that was just as cute as pigtails when they created it, but it made me feel like punching my computer.

I'm not sure if I'm getting my point across, but for a state that loves to shout freedom, they sure wanted a hell of a lot of information just so I could pay them $70. Car registration should be a simple, email-license number-VIN#-credit card.  That's it. I'm not afraid of somebody sneaking in there and paying for my registration, all this security is just plain nonsense. Seriously, it should not take six emails and one phone message to get this done.

I'm sure if I can locate all the information I entered to verify myself, MAYBE this new TxT will be helpful, but getting started is a headache (and you better set aside 15+ minutes to do it).