My wife got a fix it ticket a couple weeks ago here in California.
True story; She was pulled over for expired registration from last November, usually a huge ticket here in California. When she pulled out the paperwork to show the CHP officer, she only had the paperwork from when she bought the car in November 2023 and a letter from DMV saying she still needed to sign the back of the title from the previous owner. She also had a photocopy of the signed back of the title she had mailed back to DMV. So the CHP officer just gave her a fix it ticket! Maybe it’s her grey hair? I couldn’t believe it was only a fix it ticket!
Sorry, long story longer; after spending hours on the phone explaining the situation & emailing scans of all the paperwork to a “nice lady” in Sacramento, DMV, wait for it,
lost the paperwork! No signed title, no record of the letter they sent to my wife… nothing, except they said they can see she paid $3200 taxes and fees back in 2023. Now the “nice lady” says she has to go back to the original DMV office where she transferred the title (that is 100 miles away) to get it fixed! Totally insane…
In the last 2 years I bought 2 used cars. maybe it helps that I am in a small country so no difference between states etc... but this was the process:
Seller: Log into their personal area in the government web site.
Buyer: Log into their personal area in the government web site.
Seller: Start sale of car by adding ID# of new owner. If there are liens /unpaid tax / failed inspection or any other legal reason car can't be sold you can't do it.
Any additional registered owners also need to accept registered sale (same website... just under their name)
Any tax caused by this sale.. (handicap car purchased with discount before it can be sold tax free etc... whoever owes money will get notification)
Buyer: get notification of offer to sell car including price agreed on. Assuming this is the car you agreed upon, buyer sent to the correct person etc... you just press the accept button now both seller and buyer get a complete statement of proposed sale.
Seller... transfer money from bank (also on internet... and since I had notified my bank I was planning on making a larger than normal purchase transfer was approved and seller had notification in 1 minute...)
Buyer / seller press complete sale button.... and 10 seconds later car was registered in my name... new car license ready to print out.
At home... went into my gov account... pressed the " add additional owner" and added my wife as 2nd owner, she got notification...pressed accept got instantly updated copy of car license with 2 owners and whole process is done.
Total time to transfer ownership... under 10 minutes and I already had final legal documentation of ownership.
Now I am sure that there are probably flaws in the system somewhere but compared to going in the DMV, wasting hours, and then having them mess up the documentation anyway seems like a far better risk.