Department of Motor Vehicles

This particular DMV is definitely the best one I’ve ever been too, and I’ve been to many between living in Hawaii and now California. The staff is friendly, patient, thorough and professional.

Absolutely the best dmv experience I’ve ever had! I took my first behind the wheel test in Ventura and got the rudest examiner and she failed me for the dumbest reason. I came here and my examiner, Manny, was so friendly I wasn’t even nervous about my test. He talked to me the whole time and made me feel like I was driving with a friend. Definitely recommend this place!

The DMV has definitely upped their customer service from the last time I was there! The DMV used to be the butt of all my horrible customer service jokes because it seemed like every employee hated their job. I was pleasantly surprised when I went in today to renew my motorcycle license. Every employee I talked to today was very helpful and seemed happy to answer all my questions. People were actually smiling rather than barking orders and sending you off as quickly as possible. I don’t normally write Unilocal reviews but my experience at the DMV today was such a nice surprise that I thought I would spread the word. I don’t know the employees names who helped me but it was the guys at windows 12 and 5 and a woman on window 4 that were especially helpful to me today. Keep up the great customer service!

This is a special Shout Out to Kristina A. #24 at the SB DMV! She is one of THE BEST CUSTOMER SERVICE REPS we have ever had the pleasure of working with ANYWHERE! She was working under incredible duress — 75% of the employees were out sick and the crowd of customers was large and cranky. Our transaction was VERY complicated and she handled it with GRACE, CLASS, INTELLIGENCE and a great sense of humor. If you can get to her window, please be extra nice to her! She has a beautiful smile and can help you navigate a system that can be absolutely insane and illogical. THANK YOU KRISTINA A. !!!

What an awesome experience. I drove from thousand oaks because our DMV and surrounding ones had a 4 to 6 week appointment schedule. This one only has a 4 day lead time
I had an 1pm appointment and way over estimated my time to get there and arrived at 1130. I informed the attendant that I had an appointment and was way early and would wait. She told me I was to early for my appointment and to just take a general number and the wait was only 20 minutes.
19 minutes later I was called up by wonderfully pleasant woman named Cindy who got me the records and manuals I needed in a jiffy and was very personable and professional at the same time.
So why did I drive to a DMV that was 60 miles away? Simply for this awesome service.
I can see why people have it in their head that the DMV is a miserable place. In the ones I have been to previously there is an aire if the workers being there because they have to, they are slow, uninterested and want to go home before they even start. This is absolutey not the attitude here.
If you come on with a positive attitude you will absolutely get it back from these people. If you come in with a piss poor attitude like some of the previous posters, you are creating your own destiny and good luck to you.

Worth place ever !
What are the 2 people at the entrance doing?
If they don t know them job… Just don t do anything or put a tiket number machine.
Went twice for nothing… Stay for ever… And still need go back again !
Whish me luck!

My first college midterm was in European History from 1300 – 1715. I got an A– but the rest of the class did not fare so well. Our professor, who had just finished teaching the Reformation, said that he (and the TAs) did not subscribe to «sola fide» and that good works would be necessary for redemption. He concluded his scolding by telling the class that they’d done «execrably» poorly.
I’d never hear excrement made into an adverb, but I liked it then and if any governmental agency deserves to be compared to human excrement, this is it. I was lucky not to have to use the ACA website as my parents have a broker. I hear that went badly for hundreds of thousands American and even Obama admitted as much.
But NOTHING could redeem this pathetic excuse for a DMV, neither good Catholic works or some Calvinist understanding of predestination. It used to be annoying and dumpy. Now it’s the kind of thing that creates spontaneous coronaries in those with no history of heart disease.
Of course there’s the Dragon Lady. She’s just lovely and barks in a cacophonous accent which makes Milton’s hell seem downright New Age-​y.
The problem is that the nice Ventura DMV is closed for renovation. That means all of Ventura is coming to Santa Barbara, Santa Paula or Goleta if not LA.
The wait time is 2 – 3 hours just like it was the last time I went some 12 days ago. You can’t even get a g****** appointment in less than three or four days.
Now, in the face of this unfortunate closure, do the employees apologize profusely an kiss your ass as they should for inflicting this misery on Santa Barbarans who are constitutionally weak due to idyllic weather year round? The answer is no. They don’t seem sorry or guilty about the situation.
I want PROSTRATE DMV workers. I want DMV workers who produce apologies the way someone with Tourette’s utters profanities. I’m talking *major* groveling.
Instead, they’ve gone the other way. They’re not only not apologetic; they’re brazen and hostile. The old man is all right. And when I got to Window 10, the plain girl with no makeup in her 30s was pleasant enough. The Dragon Lady, however, needs her own reality TV show.
If Americans watch Hoarders to make them feel better about themselves and their homes (which I can’t understand because those people are psychiatrically ill and that just makes me sad), they will definitely watch The Dragon Lady of Santa Barbara DMV.
It would be cathartic. I’m sure there’s some sort of plastic covering for a flat screen TV like the plastic couch covers parents often put on their living room furniture when children are in the spilling and spit up phase of life. Throwing tomatoes (or using a Nerf gun) on the SB DMV reality TV show would be profoundly satisfying.
GRRRRRRR

Shocking. Awful. Shades of Communist Russia. And what the rest of SB will turn into if folks don’t fight back. Rude, incompetent, overpaid «public servants» doing their damnedest to produce the answer «NO» to every question. CA DMV agents have misinformed me on multiple occasions and one time they flat out LIED. You can guess what the outcome was. .. every time, they bashed me over the head with the Great Seal of the State of California and demanded more money for «my» errors. The only possible reason the DMV doesn’t have a worse rating is that most people don’t yet know you review them on places like Unilocal; it’s that OR there’s yet more corruption afoot (ie, Unilocal helping scrub these agencies’ image).

even when busy and no appt, you get through fast. I have had very pleasant experiences here, and i find that the staff goes above and beyond to get everyone in and out as quickly as possible.

Even when busy, the wait’s not that long.
Smaller cites are always the best choice when needing government services. The DMV is no different. The Santa Barbara field office is conveniently located off the 101 as long as you’re heading Southbound. Not bad for Northbound but you need to make a few turns.
18 windows and the 4 times I’ve been the line moves quickly on the weekdays where I wait, on average, 15 minutes without a reservation. These are offered through the web site but I’ve never made one.
Mon., Tues., Thurs., Friday: 8:00 AM — 5:00 PM
Wednesday: 9:00 AM — 5:00 PM
The staff is friendly but the waiting area could use a fresh coat of paint. I know CA is broke but I’ll donate a can or two to spiffy the place up. Looks like a bad doctors office. The good news people from all walks of live live in and around Santa Barbara so the people watching is always great. It’s amazing the questions people ask, how they dress and what they lie about at the DMV. Good times.
When you con’t do it on line, why drive anywhere else?