I used to love going to the county tag office. Really.
There was a nice little back room where the employees would offer cake and cookies to the neighborhood dealers. In fact, the hospitality for this particular office was so renowned that some dealers in other counties would pay them a visit. Titles would be transacted. Fees to the state would be paid, and a good chunk of those proceeds would go straight to the county coffers.
Not anymore…
New car dealers in Georgia are now transacting their titles electronically. The same is true for all car dealers in the state of Wisconsin as well as many other states throughout this country. A world that has been drowning in paper, ink and ‘duplicate titles’ is now finally entering the electronic age.
Want to go and immediately register your vehicle? Well pretty soon you may be able to without having to do so without waiting weeks, or sometimes months, to get registered. The system developed for new car dealers will inevitably spread to used car dealers… and maybe even individuals as time goes on.
This is bad news for the title clerks. I would roughly estimate that a thousand of them in Georgia alone will no longer be needed. It’s a shame because many of these folks do only good things for the community they serve. I will miss the friendships and the cakes.
Meanwhile the taxes that used to be collected in part by the county will now go straight to the state. Another sad note given that most county governments in my neck of the woods have experienced substantial revenue cuts and furlough days.
There are a few silver lining in all this though. Car dealers may no longer have to worry about lost titles that result in ticked off customers and high title replacement fees from the auctions. Potential fraud issues can also be minimized for individuals. Since the issuance of ‘temporary tags’ can be linked to the existence of a free and clear title.
Most used car dealers and individuals may still have to do out of state titles the old fashioned way for now. But I’m willing to bet that within the next five years, all titlework will be able to be transferred electronically on a national level. Call it a homeland security issue. Call it streamlining government operations. Call it a convenience factor. The outcome is inevitable.
Oh well.
People bitch about the cost of government. When something happens to bring down that cost, people still bitch.
Not much call for a 1000 people doing something “Just because” you got a slice of cake.
It’s so nice they treated the pros so well. I wish where I am, that they’d treat the general population so good.
I guess you’ll have to buy your cake now. Too bad.
The experience must vary from state to state. Rhode Island is small enough that it is centralized already. But it is also pure hell. The state hasn’t modernized any of the information systems in a long time and treats the registration and title revenues as found money. The experience is somewhat better for dealers, but generally awful for the rest of us. Every year or so, there is a news story about someone completely losing their s**t after waiting a whole day and then being told to come back another day….
At least we no longer have the “pleasure” of standing in the Apex building for countless hours…last time I was in Wakefield to fix a stupid mistake on my end, I filled out EVERY form I could possibly fill out, and stupid me crossed a few mistakes out. I had to go back and fix it…ah…election year, when EVERY politician in RI promises to fix RIDMV..and how do they do it? Let’s CLOSE the one in the Warwick Mall, and SHORTEN the hours of half of the rest that are open.
When I sold a car last summer, I had to deal with the new owner’s parking tickets for the three months it took for the ownership transfer to trickle through the system. My sympathy to the nice clerks losing their jobs, but bring on electronic transfers.
The first thing I do when I sell a car is take off my plates. No chance of parking tickets or red light camera tickets.
I wish that were possible in Minnesota. In our state plates have to stay on the car unless it is being sold over state lines. It’s rather annoying.
As for the overall story, I’ve never dealt with a DMV clerk who was anything but rude. However, our state seems to have its junk together because the wait is generally less than 20 minutes. Not sure how other states go.
In Virginia, the DMV clerks were very nice, helpful, and courteous until 9/11. Some of the 9/11 hijackers had Virginia driver’s licenses, so now everyone who comes through the door clearly must be treated as if they are terrorist. At least it was that way for 7-8 years after 9/11 — I haven’t exactly been back to the Virginia DMV.
(I moved away primarily for personal and professional reasons — but the climate of fear really did make me receptive to the idea that there might be somewhere better to live. And, sure enough, flyover country really is a better place to live. I’m really glad I left — I’ve got better things to do with my life than to prove my innocence in small ways over and over again wherever I go…)
Things have finally cooled back down with the Virginia DMV. Overall, the setup is about a decent and efficient as you can get out of state government. While I won’t praise them for their overdone friendliness, I can say that in fourteen years I’ve yet to run into the classic ‘Marge Simpson’s sisters’ type employees. The setup is a lot better than what I used to be used to in Pennsylvania (where the Notary Public lobby ran the show).
One nice thing about Virginia’s setup is that once you’ve sold your car, you get into your DMV account and notify them that the unit has been sold and on what date. Your title is immediately nullified, anything done with the car on the buyer’s drive home does not bounce back to you, and the county government is notified that the vehicle no longer falls on your personal property tax bill.
“Car dealers may no longer have to worry about lost titles that result in ticked off customers and high title replacement fees from the auctions. Potential fraud issues can also be minimized for individuals. Since the issuance of ‘temporary tags’ can be linked to the existence of a free and clear title.”
Ha! Florida has been doing this for several years now and its just as terrible and complex as it always has been.
Here, an electronic title simply means that, once a vehicle is registered to its new owner, that title and its information is simply ‘on file’ electronically. One may still request a paper title if so desired and dealers are compelled to have physical titles on hand (or proof of floorplan, etc) to offer a used vehicle for sale.
We’re slowly making the migration in Oklahoma, but since our tag agencies are private businesses doing bonded work for the state government, the online system is just farmed out to the same local tag agents.
The private business model allows customers to choose the agency that treats them best, and encourages agents to be helpful and friendly. If you are going to pay the same money wherever you go, you’ll go to the place that has the cakes (or, in the case of my favorite agent, the hottest clerks).
I don’t know how it works for dealers. But as an individual titling one car every couple of years, it’s hours in a line that looks like Guatemala City at the motor vehicles office, to finally get to a surly affirmative action clerk, followed by writing a check for a heap of money, and there most certainly isn’t any cake at the end.
I’m convinced this exists at the behest of dealers to make the process unpleasant so as to discourage private party sales.
On Canada’s left coast, you can go to any number of privately owned insurance dealers and get your car titled in a few minutes. I’ve done this twice in the last few years without any problems, surly clerks, or line ups.
No cake, but I got a free pen each time.
Racist much?
Dan pretty much nailed how it is here in Calif, albeit I would say Guadalajara as opposed to Guatemala City. Right on about the clerks.
Not sure how accurately describing a situation is “racist”
Was he stating a “hate fact”?
if anything is racist, it’s the affirmative action programs that give preferential treatment to skin color over ability, especially in lower level government no-ability-necessary jobs.
Maine makes this fairly painless. Titles are only required (or available) for cars MY 1995 and newer. Used to be 15 years rolling until last year. The paperwork is handled by the nice ladies at your local town or city hall for the most part. If you live in a place where there is no local clerk to do it you have to deal with the state BMV directly, but even that is fairly painless – they have locations at most of the shopping malls in Maine.
The state will usually get you your copy of the title in under 10 business days, and usually in less than a week. Private citizens can even buy temporary transit plates to get a new/used car home. Easy.
Being a born and bred New Englander – I don’t really get the whole “everything done at the county level” thing. We have counties, but they don’t do much of anything other than courts and sheriffs. Most all government is at either the city/town level or the state level. Just seems like an unneeded extra layer of bureaucracy to feed. Though cake does sound nice!
Depends on the state you live in. When I lived in Pennsylvania, every township, borough, city, etc. was a separate political entity. The county function was primarily the prisons (the county sheriff’s job is primarily transporting prisoners, and I remember one arrest that went thru a couple of courts before it was finally ruled that the county sheriff was a cop, just like all the others) and courthouse.
This system would have a whole lot of little police departments, staffed by part time cops, who would work for three or four boroughs townships, etc. with the political units working together on scheduling.
Come down to Virginia and you’ve got two political entities: The counties (and we’re talking the sheriff’s department is the county police, and ever deputy has a radar gun and is expected to use it often), and the larger cities (which have their own police).
For the past few years, we have been renewing our Ohio tags electronically. It’s wonderful. Now if I didn’t have to go to the BMV for my Driver License renewal…
In my experience, in the last 25 years or so, the clerks have all been extremely friendly, at least since we’ve been in Ohio. Before that, not so much. Unfortunately, in the last 20 years or so, customers have gotten much more obnoxious. Go figure. A sign of the times…
Cake? No. Hmmm…Donuts!
I bought my most recent car in 2009. The dealership was already hooked into the Secretary of State system and I had my permanent plates before driving home. The title came in the mail a couple of weeks later. Renewal can be done quickly and easily via mail, phone or internet.
I refuse to disclose my favorite location for renewing my actual license. It is in a “secret” location underground in downtown Chicago. It’s perfectly open to the public if you can find it. The clerks have actually mastered being very efficient and friendly at the same time, and they will actually take your photo as many times as needed to make sure your license photo is flattering.
I think you gave enough information it would be easy for someone to find the concourse level of a certain cook county office building. Another tip for people living in the land of windy politicians is to save their DMV business for trips downstate. People are generally more polite, the lines are shorter, and if there is a road test involved it is a lot easier. Of course, if I had a teenager I’d want them to take their exam from the strictest possible instructor in the most challenging environment I could find.
This thread is interesting mainly because I always thought calling a license plate a “tag” was a Southern thing. Apparently not as commenters from all over are using. Learn something new every day.
Tag is easier to write and say than license plate. Here in the South we get to the point.
Y’all.
I always thought that “Southern” was everything south of Interstate 80. . .
Tag and plate seem to be interchangeable terms now. There is still some variation in what to call the registration month/year and/or tax decals applied to that metal plate/tag on the car either tabs or stickers or decals though.
Hah, the New Mexico MVD doesn’t even take credit or debit cards, unless you go the MVD Express which doesn’t exist in every county.
In Arkansas, they take credit and debit cards. And charge you 3% of the total for that convenience.
That’s still a bargain to me for not having to deal with going to an office!
They charge the 3% even if you go to the office.
Only fair, that is likely what it costs them in CC processing charges. Though debit cards are MUCH cheaper.
In Maine, my city hall takes debit cards only, with a $.50 surcharge. But it will cost you $1 LESS to re-register your car online, with no fee for using a credit card. I’ll be doing that and getting ~1000 FF miles on my airline card next month. Win-win, other than the re-registration screwing.
Apparently in Minnesota, we haven’t yet adopted this. I’ve been waiting over three months for a title to my Honda.
There was a story recently about a guy here who waited almost SIX MONTHS! for the title to his truck.
Here’s a link to said story:
http://minnesota.cbslocal.com/2012/01/13/dvs-shutdown-old-tech-to-blame-for-car-title-waits/
The only fly in the ointment for me is the potential for the kind of screw-ups and outright fraud like we’ve seen with mortgages and title for real estate. Some states give the property owner the title, others let the mortgage holder hold the title, though that isn’t the system usually for personal property like cars. As potentially quick and potentially efficient as electronic record keeping promises to be, it’s still limited to the data entry bottleneck, and Lord help you if somebody misses a key stroke, especially on your VIN.
Fond memories(I dated a DMV girl) of the NJ DMV back in the 60s and 70s. The DMV agency we used really catered to dealers and salesmen. Quick service and a special “dealers only” line(no cake though). When delivering new cars, the customer came in, paid, and signed the papers, I would get him a cup of coffee, run to the DMV, get the plates and registration on the spot. Return and slap them on the car took about 15 minutes…..no need for paper temp and extra work.
Times changed and NJ DMV is now a nightmare.