Ok, I'm sick of seeing all the "DMV is satanic" posts so I thought I would tell you about a truly GOOD experience I had today. Little background here: Because I bought my project when I was 16 and it was at my parents house and on their insurance, it was ***led in my dad's name. So today I had to run to the DMV to get tabs for the wife's car, thinking I would kill 2 birds with one stone I grabbed the ***le for the project. Dad had signed it over for me months ago but had not dated it, thankfully. I figured I would have to get a gift affidavit for it because technically I did not buy it from him, he was "giving" it to me. Even though it was my car that I bought. So I'm sure I'm gonna get stuck for transfer fees, filing fees, new plates etc..... So I get up to the counter and ask for a gift affidavit, nice lady says "Your dad gave it to you?" "Yes, ma'am" "Don't need that form for family gifts" SWEET! So then I ask if I'm gonna have to buy new plates for it. I have a cherry set of 1957 plates for it and in Minnesota YOM plates are the same as collector plates. Technically you have to own the car for a year before you can get collector plates and then they nick you for another $90 bucks for those! And she says as long as you have a second vehicle with normal tags on it we can stick with the originals. DOUBLE SWEET! So what's it gonna cost me today??? $30 to transfer the ***le, done deal! Drop the $105 for the tabs for the wife's car and I'm done in less than 15 minutes! Was dreading going in, thought my afternoon was shot, but it made my day! No extra paper work, no bull **** hoops to jump through! Just a nice clerk who knew how to do her job and not completely screw with people. I just wish more people would just be nice and do their job!
I recently traded my 71 K10 straight up for a 41 Cadillac Sedanette. We went into the licensing place expecting the worst. We told them no money changed hands (non did) and we decided on a value on the vehicles of 3K each. We were sure the state of Washington would soak us for every little tax dollar they could get out of us even though no real money changed hands. 25 bucks to transfer ***les and no charge for a straight up trade. They didnt question us on the values of the vehicles...nothing. We paid the lady and shot out of there before they changed their minds. Got my ***le in the mail a couple of weeks later.
Well I had a ***le that was so worn you could barely read it and it was split at all the seams. It hadnt been active since 1958. I was worried it was trash. The girl typed it in I paid the tax and walked out no questions asked. I didnt think the ***le would work all my notary said was try it I seen worse.
Not that bad here for in the family transfers. I've done it just small reg fee and new tags if they were due. I think it was $15 last time but that's been a while.
OK Sparky,I'll take the bait on this one.... I have experience with 4 different DMV offices; San Jose/Alma-I use this one with an appointment,longest wait was 1 hour. San Jose/Santa Teresa-This one does the CDL tests,longest wait was 45 minutes. Los Gatos-Always an easy one to get in and out of,and hey,I'm in Los Gatos! Rocklin-Even faster than LG,I have walked in 3 different times and the longest wait was 20 minutes. How's that for a "Try to do this in CA" experience... .
The ladies in the Llano county courthouse are the best!! Never a bad at***ude, glad to help you, I love 'em.
I went to put my half ton Studebaker truck in my name the ***le said one ton the nice lady fixed the error to half and I went on my way with a wink and a smile.
Telling good stories is a good thing. I went to the DMV on my lunch break to register my '51 Ford Victoria with a sweet set of '51 California plates. They are five digit plates with 1P being the first two and then a space and three numbers after. The car had imitation ’63 plates with the current seven digit California numbers. I had the official white with blue letter plates under the carpet. So…I walk in with the white and blues, examples of ’51 Cal plates, the DMV process copied from the Cal DMV website and the YOMs. I ask for the form to fill out for YOMs and fill it out, get in line, get my appoint number and wait. The whole time I am waiting I am sweating that I won’t be able to register the car to these nice YOMs. When my number is up, I get to the window and immediately get the Yeah-whaddya-want look from the lady on the other side of the counter. So, I smile and ask her how long she has had the iPod she has been listening to. I schmooz about iPods and that I want to get one and how does she like it, etc. Then, her at***ude starts to lighten up. I smile a lot and try to make her feel that I am not the enemy. I present her with my quest. She told me she has only done YOMs once before and consults with her supervisor. The supervisor starts to try to tell us that this looks like a current trailer plate and can’t be done with this number configuration. I told her that it says 51 on it and showed the examples of ’51 trailer and p***enger car plates to her. She then told the lady I was working with to photocopy them and submit it and see what happens. That was the first good thing. The second good thing happened upon payment. I paid all the fees that the lady wrote up but it seemed to be less than I expected. Anyway I got out of there with both of us smiling. I got back to work and soon after got a call from my DMV lady. She said that she had missed one fee and that normally she just would have let the main office take care of it through the mail. But she told me that since I was so nice to her I was on her “A” list and that she called me so I could come back and take care of the forgotten fee now rather than drag this registration thing out for weeks. When I got back to the DMV she waved me up to the window and took care of the remaining business and life was good. Now that was cool.
What the hell, do you guys all work at the DMV?!??!?!?!?!?! The one here...is satanic and evil, and im in Indiana!! lol.
Bought a car in Arizona so it was out of state for me. On way back- get pulled over for doing 90 just outside of Blythe, Ca- car on trailer. Cop was very cool- wrote me for 80 so I could satisfy the whole deal w/ traffic school (never mentioned in ticket I was hauling a trailer). I told him I needed to register the car in California- he says follow me. I follow him to the Blythe, Ca. DMV office- right next to the CHP's office. Walk in- I'm the only person there! No lines! OMG! Fill out the paperwork- last thing needed was an inspection. Just about that time- the same cop walks in & asks me how's it going. I say I need an inspection. Walks out- looks at car- verifies VIN, signs off on it. In & out in 20 minutes. He wouldn't let me buy him lunch.
I had a great experience with the dmv bought an 02 chief blah blah blah took it to the DMV to get it reg and the lady they sent out to "inspect" the bike asks me were the smog canister is? I reach over point to the starter and she says "ohh I knew it was the round thingy and signed my papers. Thank you DMV
Trying to register our home-built, kit based modified when we lived in California was a multi-month nightmare that included a DMV supervisor telling me that the page I had printed out from their own web site covering this very situation didn't matter! So we move to Tennessee and when we present the paperwork to get our plate, the clerk had no idea what to do. But her at***ude was; "Don't worry, we'll find a way to get you registered and on your way today." She consulted briefly with her supervisor and ten minutes later we were out of there with a plate and a ***le! The difference in at***ude between the two states is amazing!
Alot of times that is what it really comes down to. They don't deal with this type of stuff all the time, and if they have a ****py at***ude, they probably just don't want to take the time to learn something new. I've been lucky enough to get someone nice everytime I needed to do something old car related, and it's all gone pretty smoothly. I've gotten the people with ****py at***udes and had problems with just the standard stuff.
It's pretty easy here in GA. You get your car tag from the county tax collector, and in a small county like where I live they get you in and out quickly. Georgia never did ***le anything back of '62 model and doesn't require a ***le on anything over 15 years old. All you need is a bill of sale, and that's all I have for Henrietta the '38 Ford pickup or Ozelle the '55 Ford. No problem running YOM tags. They register your YOM tag to the vehicle, and they issue a current Hobby/Antique tag. Carry the current Hobby/Antique tag in the vehicle, and they give you a form showing that the YOM tag is registered to the vehicle along with the registration card for the H/A tag. Registration fees and taxes on the older cars are minimal.
I used to do the whole "gift" ploy at the DMV/MVA here in Maryland when I was a teen, trying to get my various muscle cars tagged, just so I didnt have to bother with State Safety Inspections - I'd have my Mother or Father get the car ***led for me, while I worked on the car in the backyard to get it "Inspection worthy"(read: installing headers, cams, etc), then when I was ready, I'd go to MVA with the ***le, and the word GIFT written in the price window on the back. I left with a temp ***le, and a new set of plates every time - no taxes, no inspections, just a $28 transfer fee(this was the late 80s). The only trouble I have ever had was after I finished building my 69 Triumph chopper- I bought it at a swap meet, it was in a total of 27 boxes...no ***le, no VIN on the frame, turned out the motor was from Triumph that was stolen 17 years earlier! After getting sweated by the State Troopers for the afternoon, they took my word and the bill of sale at face value(and the fact that the Statute of Limitations had run out) and issued me a Vin, ***le, and Tags...
I have had the clerks here dig through the box of plates to find certain numbers. My 54 has V8-54 in the sequence and they found a plate ending in 348 (car has a W Motor) for the touring.
Every time I got to the MVD in Arizona. MVD = Motor Vehicle Dept.) Quick, efficient, folks there know what they're doing. California does ok if you're patient and go to a small town DMV. (DMV = Dept of Motor Vehicles.) Kinda funny, move to another state and the names are arranged in a different manner. California = Fish & Game. Kinda rolls off the tongue and probably cuz I lived in SoCal for so long. Arizona - Game & Fish. Still have a hard time saying it right. Figured the Saturday morning donut run crew would give me a bad time, but they're a bunch of equity refugee's from Sunny Cal as well....
I have nothing but good luck and friendly, speedy dealings with the DMV in my town, the lady I dealt with in transfering the ***le for the A knew her ****. People like to rag on the DMV for their alleged lack of efficiency but I believe the DMV can only be efficient as the person they are serving at any given time.
Kansas is awesome.......A pre 48 vehicle requires a signed bill of sale only ( use the State do***ent), and issues a ***le in just a week or so. The use of YOM plates is just as easy, and it IS your plate, no need to carry around another antique/cl***ic plate. Of course this is only my experience in a rural county Treasurer's office, it may be different in the cities.
bought a 67 mustang for my daughter in 2001. the dmv lady talked about the nascar t-shirt I had on ( she had a couple of nascar diecasts on her desk). She found a name in the system connected to the car that neither the seller nor I knew about. She wrote the name on a piece of paper, slid it across the counter to me and said "think you can sign that name without making it look like your writing?". I did and she finished up and sent me on my way.
The town size does seem to matter. Here in arrest my govenor land, Belvidere or Freeport- good. Rockford, bad. Chicago, BAH..haahaahaaaaa haaaaaaaaaaa. Guess it depends on the likelyhood of having one's work audited or some guy triing to pull something dishonest.
Alright, I need to give a slight update to this thread. So I waited the 4-6 weeks to get my new ***le in the mail. Opened it as soon as it came and found an error right away. In Minnesota they have recently changed their ***le format. The old way was like this: ***le Number -------------- 123456789000 VIN Number --------------- 000987654321 So if you weren't paying attention you could think the ***le # was actually the VIN #, when in fact the VIN # appears below where it says VIN #. Did you follow that? This is also complicated by the fact the words "***le Number" are hard to read against the fancy header work on the actual ***le. What happened is when the ***le was sent to the state for final processing they entered my old ***le number as my VIN # and the plate number did not appear on the new ***le. Sooooo, I went back to the same DMV, armed with copies of my original Texas ***le that came with the car, the Minnesota ***le with my Dad's name on it and a fairly salty at***ude. Got right in, no wait and explained the issue. No problem, the state made a mistake. Filled out one ***le correction worksheet, paid no money, another 4-6 weeks and you should have the corrected do***ent. It arrived today error free, I am happy to say! Valuable Lesson: Always check your vehicles ***le/do***entation especially after ANY changes. For the most part processing is out of our hands and mistakes can be made. The gals at the DMV said if this would have slid through un-noticed I could have had major issues down the road. Imagine being pulled over and none of your paper work matches your vehicle. Most likely a free ride to impound for the car and a whole lot of questions you don't know the answers to. So thanks again to the Robbinsdale DMV office for getting my issue handled, h***le free. AND REMEMBER TO CHECK YOUR PAPER WORK!!!!
Never had a problem or h***le with the fine folks at the Henderson County Tax ***essor's office. 5 min and I'm in & out every time. Plus it helps that one of the supervisors likes old cars...he helped me put my YOM plate on the car before I left.
Minnesota is generally pretty good about these sorts of things, but it does pay to know which office to go to - another good local one is the DMV in Golden Valley, the staff is friendly and knowledgeable and there's hardly ever a waiting line.
The Jalopy Journal
