Something Present in 'Gangnam-gu' but Absent in 'Jongno-gu'

Corporate Installation Requests Surge for Court Integrated Unmanned Issuance Machines
Not Operated in Mapo, Yeongdeungpo, Yangcheon, Jongno Districts
Expanded Corporate Services at 3 Locations in Geumcheon District with Many SMEs
880,000 Corporations Nationwide... 800,000 Are Small Businesses and Small Merchants

The mechanical device on the left side of the photo is a corporate court integrated unmanned issuance machine. The unmanned civil service issuance machine on the right provides free issuance of 88 types of documents, including resident registration certificates and national tax certificates.

Gangnam District Office has it, but Jongno District Office does not. Songpa District Office also has it, but Mapo District Office does not. Geumcheon District has installed three machines, but there are still five districts in Seoul that have not installed even one. This is none other than the Supreme Court Integrated Unmanned Issuing Machine (Court Unmanned Issuing Machine).

Lee Seung-min (49, pseudonym), a small business owner living in Sangam-dong, Mapo-gu, goes to the lobby on the first floor of Seodaemun District Office, 5 km away from his home, to obtain a corporate seal certificate. Although Mapo District Office in Seongsan-dong is nearby, this document cannot be issued there. Therefore, he uses the court unmanned issuing machine at Seodaemun District Office, which is relatively close to his home and office.

Originally, to handle corporate seal-related tasks, one must go to the court registry office or registration office, but several district offices in Seoul have allocated separate budgets and, after court approval procedures, installed and operate court unmanned issuing machines for the convenience of companies (corporate business operators). Mr. Lee said, "If I go to the Seoul Western District Court registry office within Mapo-gu to get the supporting documents, the distance is even farther, and I have to waste more than an hour on the road for a round trip," adding, "It would be good if the facilities were improved so that small corporate business operators can conveniently handle their tasks."

There are three types of documents provided by the court unmanned issuing machine. Among them, the corporate registration certificate and real estate registry copy can be issued online, but the corporate seal certificate must be issued on-site as a principle. This is why Mr. Lee, busy running his company, sometimes travels 10 km round trip to get a document that costs 1,000 won per copy.

Surprisingly, there are many corporate business operators using the court unmanned issuing machines. One machine at Geumcheon District Office issued over 800 corporate documents in the past week. According to Geumcheon District Office's statistics, from the beginning of this year to the 23rd of this month, over about 130 days (weekdays only), 23,900 documents were issued from this machine. Considering it operates only during district office working days and opening hours, the number of users is considerable.

Kim Jin-ah, a civil affairs passport officer at Geumcheon District Office, explained, "In Geumcheon-gu, we operate one machine at the district office and two machines at the Corporate Support Center in Gasan Digital Complex," adding, "Reflecting the characteristics of Geumcheon-gu, which has many small and medium-sized enterprises, we support companies so that they do not experience inconvenience."

In Seoul, besides Geumcheon-gu, Gangnam-gu, Gangseo-gu, and Seongdong-gu each operate two machines, and 15 districts including Guro-gu operate one machine each. Seocho-gu installed a court unmanned issuing machine at the OK Civil Service Center this year after reflecting the budget last year, but it has not yet been operational as it is waiting for court approval. Dobong-gu responded that it did not install one because the Seoul Northern District Court registry office is close to the district office. Additionally, some districts such as Mapo-gu, Yangcheon-gu, Yeongdeungpo-gu, and Jongno-gu either did not know about the existence of the court unmanned issuing machine or did not feel the need to introduce it.

According to the Supreme Court, as of July, local governments nationwide operate a total of 85 court unmanned issuing machines. Seoul district offices operate 24 machines, and metropolitan local governments operate 18 in Gyeonggi, 10 in Daegu, 9 in Incheon, and 5 each in Busan and Chungbuk. Ulsan, Gangwon, Gyeongnam, and Jeonnam each operate one machine, while Jeju has none at all.

According to the Basic Statistics on Small and Medium Enterprises by the Ministry of SMEs and Startups, the number of corporations in South Korea was 883,600 as of the end of 2020. Among these, excluding large enterprises (9,300) and medium enterprises (74,000), about 800,000 are small businesses or small business owners with corporate registration. More than 30,000 corporations are newly established in Seoul alone every year.