The responses to the question about the inspection got me thinking...have you ever had your car stuff expire? Mine does ALL THE TIME. Literally in the 10 years I've been married and delegated this to my husband (who has relatively few responsibilities in the household) my excise tax, license, registration, and inspection stickers have never been paid or renewed on time. Not once, ever. I can't even imagine the amount we've paid in fees for this.
I'd be more ticked off except that I wasn't good about this stuff when I was single either, which is why I gave it to him to take care of! I tried to take it back a couple of years ago by giving him dentist and doctor appointments as his responsibility instead but he failed miserably at those so I said forget it, go back to managing the cars. Right now I have an inspection sticker issued from another state in 2011 that expired in 2013 (and was never valid in my state to begin with, it should have been inspected when we bought the car in 2011)...my registration expired in January, and I can't register the car until he pays the excise tax, and pays the tickets that he got last month while the car was parked for...you guessed it...expired registration and inspection stickers! I drove on an expired license for almost a year a couple of years ago.
Honestly given the driving administrative track record you'd never know that I really am an organized, competent, efficient person who is capable of getting things done day in and day out at work, home, my kids' schools, etc. But man, if a task is attached to a vehicle I just. don't. want. to do it! Give me menu planning, health insurance, taxes...anything but cars.
Interesting that many of you get notifications...I think they still send out a postcard for registration but not licenses. Not that a paper notice ever prompted me to think "hey I'll get right on that!" but now that they don't do it anymore...yikes. I've actually had my car towed - twice! - for non-registration or expired license issues. After the last time I swore that I'd change my ways and this would be the year we get on it but yeah...just noticed last week about the inspection sticker and registration so that ship has sailed...
Just had an idea...I bet I could pay one of my teenagers to own this. A small fee for filling out the paperwork and reminding us would be way less money than fines, right?
Once after switching cars I was a day or two late on an inspection... My dad used to fix cars, so it was kind of hard to not be on top of it...
Once I registered my car before the end of the month and stuck in in the glove compartment in October. On New Year's Day, the cop stopped me and told me my registration was lapsed and I told him no it wasn't and he said it was. So I took out my registration and showed it to him - he no give me ticket but told me I needed to put the new one on the plate.
He didn't make his quota on me.
Thank goodness I had remembered that the registration was in the car.
the other S.
Nope, I've never let them lapse. I have forgotten to pick up kids after school, dropped them off on a day the school is closed, shown up to multiple events late or completely forgotten them, mixed up dates and gone to the wrong thing on the wrong day...but...I've never forgotten to get the car inspected, or the insurance or registration renewed lol!
That's funny JB! No, I have NEVER had something lapse with my car. I'm weirdly neurotic about it for some reason. One time I got stopped and couldn't find my insurance card (which I did indeed have) and I started crying I was so upset (geez).
The rest of my life is an unorganized mess. But car registrations - CHECK!
:p
Stuff happens, but I try to keep the cars legal and utilities turned on. Reconnect fees for utilities are expensive, not to mention the inconvenience of being without power or water until they turn them back on.
Letting car insurance lapse here is a big no no and my insurance company will only reinstate a lapsed policy once over the life of the policy. So two lapses and you have to find another insurance company.
A friend lost his job a couple of months ago. Couldn't afford to pay his car insurance with no job. Couldn't get the car inspected with no insurance. Found another job and was due to start this week. Last week, got pulled over for the expired inspection sticker, then the car was impounded for no insurance.
Nope. Always on time or early.
A single time I was exactly 1 day late because the due date got written on the calendar as the day after it was due. I rarely leave it to the last minute though. It was the same year something major in our life happened and I was totally off my game so it didn't surprise me at all, even though I was completely embarrassed.
Edit: Even the year there was a clerical error and they got our address change wrong I tracked it down and got it paid on time.
Darn, JB - you must have a lot of money laying around!!! The fees for late or past due registration can get expensive....
We've had it twice...in 2010 - our vehicle registration for my husband's car. To this day - we could've sworn we bought the two year registration - it was our son's 8th birthday and we were pulled over going to dinner for his birthday...the cop did NOT give us a ticket because he loved the 0bama sticker (One Big A$$ Mistake America) on the back of the car...and said get 'er done...it was done the next day...
The other was 2012 - my van was in the shop. And it expired while in the shop - we paid it - but it was late - after midnight the date it was due and then we lost the stickers!! My husband was unemployed and the repairs were about $3K so it sat for a while at the shop while we made payments... called the DMV when we picked up the van and had the DOH moment! I was able to stop at the DMV on the way home with my van and pick up new stickers...
Other than that? Nope. You get an invoice or notification...there's really no excuse to let it lapse.
So this reminded me that while I got my sticker for my tag a few weeks ago, I don't think I actually put it on...and am not all that sure where it is! I'm generally pretty good at getting the tags updated, since they send something a month in advance in the mail, but a couple years ago I didn't notice that my license had expired 6 months before. I was flying to visit my sister, and the TSA agent helpfully informed me. He let me fly, and when I was flying home that agent didn't even notice it was expired, so I suppose flying with a valid license is only a suggestion.
Nope never let that stuff lapse. Hubby is always on top of that stuff.
Once.
I noticed my inspection sticker expired 1 day after it did.
I had it inspected immediately and got it taken care of before I got a ticket for it.
We don't let things lapse here.. I am on top of all that stuff.
Our cars have regularly scheduled care and that typically falls around the inspection time so my dealer takes care of it when the cars are in getting the yearly checks and updates.
As for registration... our county sends the invoice to you over a month in advance so that one is a no brainer. You have a choice to mail it in or go in person.
I am very organized and close to OCD when it comes time for any renewals, etc around here.
JB - I am a DMV's dream.. or nightmare, I'm not sure!
I never remember to renew my car license plate sticker... it's not like I -look- at it all the time, & the renewal notice they send is just a postcard, which 1/2 the time the postman delivers to the neighbors by mistake.
I was stopped a couple years ago for speeding (common occurence for me!), and at the same time, had an expired plate sticker AND an expired license to drive!!
It would really be easier if everything in my life fell at the same time... all bills on the 1st of the month, all DMV fees on the first month of the year (just as an example, I'd actually prefer June). So that way, I could budget ahead of time, & get it all one in one fell swoop.
At any rate, you are not alone. One of these days I'm gonna figure out how to set up an onliine calendar with reminders!! T.
Not me, but happens to my husband every time. ADHD is for a lifetime and gets worse with age....
Yes - I told the whole crazy story in the last post, but basically we moved, I updated all of our registration addresses with the DMV, and somehow on my car, they didn't update the mailing address, so the registration never made it to our new house. In the chaos of moving our whole family, new schools/teachers mid-year for the kids, starting a new job, etc, I overlooked that the registration hadn't arrived. By the time I realized it, the fines were over $400. UGH.
So, after lots of hassle with the DMV (trying to get them to change my mailing address - which was WAY harder than you would imagine), you can bet I was waiting for that registration to arrive the following year. It didn't! So I had to go down to the DMV AGAIN and go through the whole process AGAIN. This time my registration was on time, but only because I had had a reminder on my phone to deal with it, and again, no thanks to the DMV.
Fast forward to the next year. Surely after having gone down there 2 years in a row and having them change my mailing address twice, the registration should have been mailed to the correct address, right? NOPE! STILL didn't come. Had to go down there again.
To make matters worse, by this time we were in escrow (but had not yet closed escrow) on a new house. You can only imagine how terrified I was of changing my address to a whole new address with the DMV. By some miracle, the California DMV will now allow you to change your mailing address online, and you even get a confirmation e-mail showing the updated information. So this time, instead of having to rely on the incompetent idiots at my local DMV office (normally I'm more charitable, but COME ON, PEOPLE - 3 YEARS to change a mailing address?!), I was able to do it myself.
Do I still have the yearly reminder on my phone anyway? Yes. Yes, I do. :-P
Ummm.. no?
I actually had an expired tag once--the day we moved into this state, actually. My tag was still good in Florida (where we moved from), but me moved into the state of Georgia ON my birthday (which happens to be the tag renewal date in this state). We closed on our house ON my birthday (so legally our change of address), at the close of business. So I couldn't get to the tag office until the next day = $20 late fee.
I've never had an expired driver's license. Ever. In almost 30 years of driving. We don't have/do inspection stickers in our state, but when I lived where it was required, I got those done on time. Otherwise I couldn't renew my tag on time (which I always did).
The only other time I had to pay a late fee for my tag was when I mailed in the renewal, and they didn't accept my check because it wasn't a "local" check. I was dumbfounded. Small town life I guess? They only accepted checks from banks that were located within the county. Go figure. So it was returned to me with a late notice. Joy.
I can put off doing a lot of things, and forget a lot of things, but it is pretty much beyond me how you can not pay the taxes/tag renewal for the registration on your car. Our county also sends a reminder slip (so you can mail in that local check--eye roll). What's annoying about that (to me) is that they send it like 6 weeks out. So when it actually arrives, you can't act on it. Because they won't renew your tag more than 4 weeks (30 days) prior to the expiration. :(
Yes, this happens to us for the same reason. My husband is supposed to be in charge, but doesn't stay on top of it.
I can't really complain too much. My driver's license expired in August 2013. I didn't renew it until Feb 2014. It just sits in my wallet, and I never look at it. I had no idea it was expired.
My very first time that I was pulled over by a police officer it was for an expired inspection sticker. I felt so dumb...but my dealership always just replaced it for me during my Christmas break from college. I had graduated the previous December and because I was no longer regularly driving 800 miles each way, I hadn't gotten my car serviced. It was very embarrassing because it was over two months out of date.
So skip ahead to last week... and my friends and I are visiting, telling stories about our first time to get a ticket. I get in the car to drive home to discover that *gasp* my inspection sticker is going to be two months our of date the next day. I got one the following morning.
I got my registration renewal today in the mail...on the 1st as you can see and it expired yesterday...so I cut that one close this year as well.
But no usually I am on top of it. Just twice have I totally forgotten...
We've never had the car registration expire. Our state sends a renewal postcard/bill 2+ months before the expiration. I pay it right away, I don't wait for the expiration date to approach. Online payment takes just a few minutes and the new tags come within 10 days.
I also pay the insurance in full at each 6-month renewal, rather than making monthly payments. We get a $60 discount. I don't like waiting for things to come due before handling them.
That said, I can walk out of one room and forget what I was planning to do in the next room by the time I get there. All the time!
I've paid fines a few times... Once I ordered the tags online, and they sent them to Chicago to the car maker's leasing office instead of to me. I don't remember what happened the other times. Any chore that requires me to remember one time a year, that the notice gets sent out two months ahead of the deadline, that I have to drive to an office somewhere that's open limited hours... Just doesn't go that well for me. Luckily our state quit requiring inspections.
No...we actually only have to renew driver's licenses every 6 or 8 years and a notification comes in the mail for it. We have our tags come in the mail every year. I always put the notification in my pile of bills to pay. I know that I am going to pay bills twice a month correlating with paydays. Everything goes in one spot so I don't forget...
