New DMV Nightmare

marshg246

marshg246

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I bought my 850 rider in 2015 from the 2nd owner in PA. It has been titled and registered in VA ever since then and has not left VA. Looking at my VA DMV record I noticed that they have my bike listed as sold. When I checked with them, they say it was recently titled in MI and they would investigate. They did and MI replied that indeed it was titled. So, the VA DMV said call MI. Calling the VA DMV is a PITA, calling the MI DMV is a MAJOR PITA. I'm on the phone with them for the 5th time today. It's 2:01pm and my first call was at 9am. I've done nothing else today. So, MI said there was nothing they could do - when I mentioned fraud, they said call the police. I called the MI State Police - then can do nothing for a VA resident - they said call your local police. I called the Fairfax County police - finally someone helpful. He looked up the record and said indeed the VIN was registered in MI, but it is not a motorcycle. Later found out that is a 2005 tractor. It's impossible to have a 6-digit VIN for a 2005 vehicle! So, I called the VA DMV again and they admitted that they already knew that it is not a motorcycle, but the "national system" only records the VIN of sold/stolen/destroyed vehicles and only MI can fix it. So, I'm back on hold at the MI DMV waiting to talk to a "technician". The last two times I was waiting for a technician i was cut off.

Keep an eye on your records - I don't know if there are other old bikes with 6-digit VIN numbers. Triumph always starts with a letter and if I remember right BSA does as well. I don't know about the rest.

Basically, MI has caused my bike to be un-ridable since it is deemed to be unregistered and untitled.

VA checks the "national system" before titling, I guess MI does not and also, they use no logic since the VIN is impossible for a 2005 vehicle!
 
Finally talked to a technician. He will send a letter to the tractor owner for a VIN check. If they find an error, they will fix it. Otherwise, I'll have to part out my bike as it is illegal to ride.

I've been involved with IT since 1978 and I hate what computers have done in many cases. At least five people today have said that this problem is impossible since no two vehicles can have the same VIN and the stupid national registry only goes by VIN because some idiot in DC wrote the task order for the software thinking the same.
 
Could have been a simple recording error by other owner or DMV. Could also be possible it is some old vintage tractor and the numbers are infact identical to your bike by co-ink dink.
Also, why is a tractor needing to be road registered?

Seems odd that someone could submit a VIN and then trigger the invalidation of another registration. Any same number entered should signal red flags.

Are you certain your bike has an authentic VIN (matching frame/engine/GB; etc)?
 
Tornado said:
Could have been a simple recording error by other owner or DMV. Could also be possible it is some old vintage tractor and the numbers are infact identical to your bike by co-ink dink.
Also, why is a tractor needing to be road registered?

Seems odd that someone could submit a VIN and then trigger the invalidation of another registration. Any same number entered should signal red flags.

Are you certain your bike has an authentic VIN (matching frame/engine/GB; etc)?
Click to expand...
Absolutely sure my VIN is right - all matchomg including the copy of the 1st and 2nd owner's titles and the original dealer bill of sale.

VA has a program that compares its active VINs to the national database. When there is a match from other than VA titling the vehicle, it marks the registration and title as sold - in other words, invalid.

VA checks the national database before titling. MI does now but didn't when the tractor was originally titled in 2014 (just found that out) and VA didn't check in 2015 when I bought it. Since the tractor had a valid MI title form 2014, when sold recently in MI, they didn't check.

Since the tractor is titled as a 2005, it should not have a 6-digit VIN. However, minibikes/motorbikes (US term) often had simple serial numbers when VA started requiring them to be titled so who knows?
 
That's just crazy. You would think the guy with the tractor should have the trouble with registering not you since you were titled first

Of course logic does not apply to government functions
 
TomU said:
That's just crazy. You would think the guy with the tractor should have the trouble with registering not you since you were titled first

Of course logic does not apply to government functions
Click to expand...
The problem is that it was titled in in 2014 when neither MI or VA used the national system. Then I titled in 2015, again when neither used the system. Then when recently re-titled they didn't bother to check since it was a MI title to a new owner MI title. A big problem is the utter stupidity of using the VIN alone in the national database. Even more annoying is that it is a 2005 Tractor and MI accepted a 6-character VIN.

You can bet some Govt. hack and 3rd rate programmer are patting themselves on the back for matching the state records to the nation record.

I've spent hours on this and at every turn except one: "There's nothing we can do". The technician in MI says that if they find the VIN wrong, they will fix it but otherwise: "There's nothing we can do"

Finally, in VA you are breaking the law if you don't report a registered vehicle sold, which obviously I didn't. But when they decide that you did, they mark and don't notify you - I guess I'm lucky I didn't get arrested for not telling them!
 
marshg246 said:
The problem is that it was titled in in 2014 when neither MI or VA used the national system. Then I titled in 2015, again when neither used the system. Then when recently re-titled they didn't bother to check since it was a MI title to a new owner MI title. A big problem is the utter stupidity of using the VIN alone in the national database. Even more annoying is that it is a 2005 Tractor and MI accepted a 6-character VIN.

You can bet some Govt. hack and 3rd rate programmer are patting themselves on the back for matching the state records to the nation record.

I've spent hours on this and at every turn except one: "There's nothing we can do". The technician in MI says that if they find the VIN wrong, they will fix it but otherwise: "There's nothing we can do"

Finally, in VA you are breaking the law if you don't report a registered vehicle sold, which obviously I didn't. But when they decide that you did, they mark and don't notify you - I guess I'm lucky I didn't get arrested for not telling them!
Click to expand...
Can you engage you state governor or local representative? Have heard of them sometimes clearing up the beuroracy for constituents on occasion.
 
Tornado said:
Can you engage you state governor or local representative? Have heard of them sometimes clearing up the beuroracy for constituents on occasion.
Click to expand...
I did that once before in for an even more ridiculous DMV mess but that was fighting stupid human errors with regulations. I'll try it again, but since it's technology everyone can say there's no way to fix it so I hold out little hope.

The DMV technician did mention that they are starting to have a variety of problems due to the national system. For one thing, it's not integrated with the state systems and a DMV worker has to type to VIN into the system!
 
You have been enveloped into the never ending vortex of the licensing/registration bureaucracy.
They regale in their illogical and regressive actions.

I purchased my complete but non-running Commando from a collector friend in Nevada.
No title.
Shipped it to my residence, Midwest.
It took me almost a year to get a new title assigned. I had to hire a lawyer for legal guidance. I had to go through the Highway Patrol. I had to go to court.
The worst was dealing face to face with the DOT-Licensing rep with the pink hair, facial and neck tats to go with the ring in her nose who I could not understand even with my hearing aids on.
She resented my new title requests because she was clueless in the performance of her job, thus the lawyer to circumvent her stonewalling oversight.
Once the proper documents were acquired, (thanks to my attorney) from the DOT- licensing bureau, the judge finally approved my application for new title.

Now that I had a proper title and the restoration was complete I then had to to get it legally licensed.
Guess what pink haired "expert" I had to go through for proper licensing.
I will save the rest for another thread other than to say I had to get the chief of police of my municipality involved.
I hate dedicating my time to clueless dink brains, life's too short.

You have my sympathies Greg.
 
You can practically build a bike with new AN parts. That would probably be a good conversation with DMV
 
Oh dear. I may be in for it. Some twenty years ago or possibly more I registered my 1960 Matchless as a collector vehicle. The state (WA) issues a permanent license plate and a paper registration too and notes that on a new title. If there is no activity for some period of time the title and registration are deleted from the state database. I discovered that because on another bike, had I not had an original of the title when I went to register it as a collector vehicle, I couldn't have done it as the state had no record of it whatsoever. I had not registered that bike for over 10 years. In the case of the 1960 Matchless, the plate has no expiration date but the paper registration gives the expiration date as 2 years from the date of application for a collector title, while the title gives no expiration date and lists the registration as permanent.

I thought about getting a registration paper with no expiration date to match the title in case a cop stops me on some pretext but then I thought about letting sleeping dogs lie... I'm not likely to get stopped plunking around on our rural roads; just the same Greg's story makes me nervous.
 
Petition for a hearing before your local district judge with all your ducks in a row, including a detailed explanation of exactly how legal your bike is, as a classic with an outdated serial numbering system.

Get a favorable ruling and go over all the numb skulls.
 
AAMVA.org replied:
"Thank you for your inquiry concerning your motorcycle. There is no indication that your vehicle has been stolen. Your motorcycle has is a nonstandard VIN that is shared by a tractor trailer in Michigan. VINs are not unique identifier for vehicles and sometimes VINs may be shared with other vehicles. The entries in NMVTIS are appropriate.

If you sell the vehicle, any state will be able verify your title by calling state in which it is titled, in your case Virginia. If you want to resolve this issue permanently you may request the state in which your vehicle is titled to issue a state issued VIN. This will separate the two vehicles and will eliminate the need the state to verify outside of NMVTIS."

I replied to that:
"See the details below.

The short version is: VA has an automatic system to invalidate titles/registration when a VIN is titled in another state – that’s is what happened to me. VA insists that they cannot fix that, and that MI will have to remove their VIN. MI insists that they cannot do that unless the VIN is proven wrong. That has not happened.

VA will not issue a state VIN and if they would it would destroy the value of my motorcycle and turn it into a 2022 motorcycle with a non-standard title that could no longer support a historic registration – that in turn would cost me hundreds of dollars per year.

Somehow, your organization and/or the DoJ need to make the States understand the system and quit doing this. I now know of several more cases in various states who have similar problems – each State acts differently. I am being pushed to lead a class action suit on this – I really don’t want to spend the rest of my life fighting your organization and the DoJ, but I really don’t like that my motorcycle has been stolen by bureaucracy and that I have a collection of motorcycles that can be stolen one-by-one in the same manner.

Here’s the body of what I wrote to NMVTIS. Their response led me to you:

“I’m have a DMV issue that is complicated and may affect hundreds to thousands of US Citizens. I’ll give you the shortest rundown I can but realize that this represents over 9 hours on the phone in one day and a lot of effort after that. I’m not sure who to ask for help.
  • I happened to be looking something up in my VA DMA portal and noticed that my primary motorcycle is listed as sold. Since it is not sold, is in my garage, is properly titled and registered I was of course concerned and very happy that I didn’t find out by the police pulling me over and checking the registration. I obviously did not inform the DMV that it was sold – it was not.
  • I called the DMV in Richmond. Once I finally got to a human and explained over and over, she finally understood and said she would turn over to the titling group and they would answer in 48 hours. She left me a voice mail many days later saying that it was titled in MI recently and therefore I have to talk to MI’s DMV (Secretary of State).
  • Called MI’s DMV and was told they could do nothing - it was properly titled. When I mentioned that fraud was clearly committed, they said to call the police.
  • I called the MI State Police who informed me that since I was not a MI resident that they could do nothing and to call my local police.
  • I called the Fairfax County police and the officer asked for a few minutes to look it up. He came back on and stated that my VIN was indeed titled in MI, but it was a tractor, not a motorcycle.
  • I called the VA DMV in Richmond DMV again. After a lot of explaining she transferred me to the original lady. I told her about it being a tractor at which point she said she knew that because MI told her via email, but that didn’t matter – she nastily said: “I told you we can do nothing you must work with MI”. She explained that the computer looks for titling in other states and only goes by the VIN so there is no room for mistakes. More on this in a minute.
  • I called the MI DMV again and finally got to a “technician” supposedly with the power to fix it. He said that there was no way to fix it as it’s a national system that only goes by the VIN. But he would write a letter to the company in MI that titled the tractor and have them check the VIN. If the VIN is wrong, he can change that. That was about three weeks ago and I’ve heard nothing.
What caused this:
  • The primary cause is that VA, et. Al. consider a VIN to be 17 unique characters and don’t realize that was not always the case.
  • My 1974 Norton commando is serial number 310311 – that is its VIN – both in reality and on my Title and Registration
  • The 2005 Tractor was titled in MI using that number. Then sold to someone else in 2014 when the national system was not being used.
  • I bought and titled my bike in VA in 2015 when the national system was not being used or the VIN didn’t show up.
  • The tractor was sold again this year to a MI company and since they had a valid MI title to transfer, they didn’t bother checking the national system, but their computer did send the info to the national system.
  • Since a 2005 vehicle must have a 17-character VIN I assume that either in 2005 tractors didn’t need a VIN or someone titled it using the first number they saw on some part of the tractor.
Most importantly is it extremely short sighted that:
  • The national system, I assume you, only goes by VIN
  • The VA DMV quietly invalidates titles and registrations based on that system
  • That everyone in the VA and MI DMVs says that nothing can be done.
VA law requires owners to inform the DMV when a vehicle is sold or otherwise disposed but they don’t even inform you when they summarily invalidate. It’s ridiculous that I now have a $13,000 motorcycle that is illegal to ride or sell. It is my opinion that it was functionally stolen from me by the fraudulent actions of two states based upon the info in your database.”
 
Can you just attempt to insure or renew the MC as if you know of no issues? Just to see what they do with it? You cottoned on to this via some random check you made on your records....maybe when they do a normal renewal porcess they will see flags/procedures where they can fix it?
 
Tornado said:
Can you just attempt to insure or renew the MC as if you know of no issues? Just to see what they do with it? You cottoned on to this via some random check you made on your records....maybe when they do a normal renewal porcess they will see flags/procedures where they can fix it?
Click to expand...
It is insured and it cannot be renewed for two reasons:

1) No title to renew against - I have the paper title but the DMV records have it invalidated.
2) It's a permeant registration - not to renew.
 
I have:
My motorcycle
A valid certificate of title
Multiple ways to enforce my property
Live Free or Die

Greg, I think just letting it ride would be my M.O.


JMWO
 
All the following was, and is, about a motorbike. Now think of why the nation and indeed the world is in the state that it is in. This
story is just the tip of the iceberg. This is another case of the micro explaining the macro.
I would guess that the expensive services of a solicitor would eventually resolve the situation but that the cost will likely eventually exceed that of the vehicle in question.
 
marshg246 said:
AAMVA.org replied:
"Thank you for your inquiry concerning your motorcycle. There is no indication that your vehicle has been stolen. Your motorcycle has is a nonstandard VIN that is shared by a tractor trailer in Michigan. VINs are not unique identifier for vehicles and sometimes VINs may be shared with other vehicles. The entries in NMVTIS are appropriate.

If you sell the vehicle, any state will be able verify your title by calling state in which it is titled, in your case Virginia. If you want to resolve this issue permanently you may request the state in which your vehicle is titled to issue a state issued VIN. This will separate the two vehicles and will eliminate the need the state to verify outside of NMVTIS."

I replied to that:
"See the details below.

The short version is: VA has an automatic system to invalidate titles/registration when a VIN is titled in another state – that’s is what happened to me. VA insists that they cannot fix that, and that MI will have to remove their VIN. MI insists that they cannot do that unless the VIN is proven wrong. That has not happened.

VA will not issue a state VIN and if they would it would destroy the value of my motorcycle and turn it into a 2022 motorcycle with a non-standard title that could no longer support a historic registration – that in turn would cost me hundreds of dollars per year.

Somehow, your organization and/or the DoJ need to make the States understand the system and quit doing this. I now know of several more cases in various states who have similar problems – each State acts differently. I am being pushed to lead a class action suit on this – I really don’t want to spend the rest of my life fighting your organization and the DoJ, but I really don’t like that my motorcycle has been stolen by bureaucracy and that I have a collection of motorcycles that can be stolen one-by-one in the same manner.

Here’s the body of what I wrote to NMVTIS. Their response led me to you:

“I’m have a DMV issue that is complicated and may affect hundreds to thousands of US Citizens. I’ll give you the shortest rundown I can but realize that this represents over 9 hours on the phone in one day and a lot of effort after that. I’m not sure who to ask for help.
  • I happened to be looking something up in my VA DMA portal and noticed that my primary motorcycle is listed as sold. Since it is not sold, is in my garage, is properly titled and registered I was of course concerned and very happy that I didn’t find out by the police pulling me over and checking the registration. I obviously did not inform the DMV that it was sold – it was not.
  • I called the DMV in Richmond. Once I finally got to a human and explained over and over, she finally understood and said she would turn over to the titling group and they would answer in 48 hours. She left me a voice mail many days later saying that it was titled in MI recently and therefore I have to talk to MI’s DMV (Secretary of State).
  • Called MI’s DMV and was told they could do nothing - it was properly titled. When I mentioned that fraud was clearly committed, they said to call the police.
  • I called the MI State Police who informed me that since I was not a MI resident that they could do nothing and to call my local police.
  • I called the Fairfax County police and the officer asked for a few minutes to look it up. He came back on and stated that my VIN was indeed titled in MI, but it was a tractor, not a motorcycle.
  • I called the VA DMV in Richmond DMV again. After a lot of explaining she transferred me to the original lady. I told her about it being a tractor at which point she said she knew that because MI told her via email, but that didn’t matter – she nastily said: “I told you we can do nothing you must work with MI”. She explained that the computer looks for titling in other states and only goes by the VIN so there is no room for mistakes. More on this in a minute.
  • I called the MI DMV again and finally got to a “technician” supposedly with the power to fix it. He said that there was no way to fix it as it’s a national system that only goes by the VIN. But he would write a letter to the company in MI that titled the tractor and have them check the VIN. If the VIN is wrong, he can change that. That was about three weeks ago and I’ve heard nothing.
What caused this:
  • The primary cause is that VA, et. Al. consider a VIN to be 17 unique characters and don’t realize that was not always the case.
  • My 1974 Norton commando is serial number 310311 – that is its VIN – both in reality and on my Title and Registration
  • The 2005 Tractor was titled in MI using that number. Then sold to someone else in 2014 when the national system was not being used.
  • I bought and titled my bike in VA in 2015 when the national system was not being used or the VIN didn’t show up.
  • The tractor was sold again this year to a MI company and since they had a valid MI title to transfer, they didn’t bother checking the national system, but their computer did send the info to the national system.
  • Since a 2005 vehicle must have a 17-character VIN I assume that either in 2005 tractors didn’t need a VIN or someone titled it using the first number they saw on some part of the tractor.
Most importantly is it extremely short sighted that:
  • The national system, I assume you, only goes by VIN
  • The VA DMV quietly invalidates titles and registrations based on that system
  • That everyone in the VA and MI DMVs says that nothing can be done.
VA law requires owners to inform the DMV when a vehicle is sold or otherwise disposed but they don’t even inform you when they summarily invalidate. It’s ridiculous that I now have a $13,000 motorcycle that is illegal to ride or sell. It is my opinion that it was functionally stolen from me by the fraudulent actions of two states based upon the info in your database.”
Click to expand...
The burden of proof is on them. Can they produce notification from you it was sold?
 
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