I definitely have been asked many times in NY for “license, insurance and registration” while on my bike, though usually the cops are checking for proper licensing and proof of current insurance. I keep my registration and insurance docs on my bike, which has a “document compartment” built into the passenger backrest on the seat (Kawasaki VN750), in a Ziploc bag to keep them from getting wet and sticking together when it rains. I’ve also used the grifter license plate box for other bikes. It works well but definitely use some loc-tite or similar adhesive to avoid having the lock vibrate loose and fall completely off of the holder (which happened to me once).
I don’t think NYS require you to carry any documents in your car, so much as they want you to be able to produce them for a police officer upon request.
The back of the NYS vehicle registration specifically states “the face of this document may be photocopied”.
I’ve always made a copy to keep in my wallet, while the original is safe at home. In a rental car, your rental paperwork is all that’s needed in order to fulfill the ‘registration and insurance’ part of the request.
The insurance paper is larger than the registration, so I always keep that in the glove box. But I prefer carrying the registration with me.
I keep my registration in the glove box because I need it for military base access and for parking passes. It’s just easier and I don’t have to remember to bring it.
I believe that is SOP here in Germany where carrying (a short form of) car registration is mandatory (there is a long form which I believe is only handed over when selling a car). IIRRC for cars with several users (e.g. company car) the registration is usually passed along with the keys. It would indeed be somewhat ill advised to leave it in the car.
Do any of the US States have a similar system to the one in Australia/NZ, whereby there’s a sticker on your windscreen which has your car registration, and the expiry date, and effectively says to the police “This car is registered [and, in Australia, has Compulsory Third Party Insurance]”?
I’m not aware of anywhere here that requires you to have the car’s registration documents in the car or on your person anytime you drive it, although you do need to have the registration sticker affixed to your windscreen which, one presumes, accomplishes the same thing…
What you are talking about is called the “title” in the US - proof of ownership. One should not keep the title in the car. The registration shows that I have paid my annual tax to the state (Georgia). There may be states where you do not pay tax on your car, but still have an annual registration.
Yes. In Georgia we have a sticker on our license plate that shows the month and year when the registration is due for renewal. That date is the birthday month of the owner of the vehicle.
Texas does it this way, too.
Here in South Australia, cars no longer even carry the sticker on the windscreen. June was the last month they were issued, so in another 6 months no cars will have them. The logic being that modern communications and computer databases have made even stickers obsolete. Most modern cars have the VIN visible form the outside, so it is trivial to match up plates and car ID when pulled over. Police can look up the registration on the spot. We have the cute little police car mounted license plate monitoring cameras running too, so police can get automatic notification of out of registration cars (which here implicitly means lack of third partly insurance - which is the real offence) as you drive past.
One thing they are very clear about here when registering a car. Registration is not the same as proof of ownership/title. In particular registration of a car does not prove the lack of a lien against the car, or that it was not stolen interstate. This is something that annoys a lot of people. There is a lack of inter-state cooperation over this (although it is improving.)
I will confess I have never understood some countries or states that have such astoundingly strict rules about carrying paperwork for a car. It simply seems to be a mechanism for creating fines and annoying people.
New York State does this, with a windshield sticker; it does not, however, mean you’ve got insurance. But, if you should allow your insurance to lapse, your carrier will helpfully notify the state immediately, and your registration will be suspended. So if you get pulled over for any reason, you’ve automatically got two violations.
I wonder why in this day and time, it is even required for a driver to physically carry a driver’s license, registration, and proof of insurance. As others have said, the cops can run your tag and see if it is valid. If you have let your insurance lapse, your carrier is required to notify the state who would then suspend your tag, which suspension would show up in the previous step.
If you aren’t carrying a paper copy of your license, you can tell the cop that you are John Smith who lives on 123 Popular Drive in Anyborough. The cop can pull up a digital image of your license and compare the picture with the person standing there, and also verify that the license is valid.
You might say that it is easier on the cop for you to have this stuff in paper form, but in my understanding, they do all of the above in a traffic stop anyways. Why the need for papers, please?
Experienced police officers are aware that out of state vehicles may not need to carry a paper registration. Maybe some wet-behind-the-ears cop will hassle you momentarily, but they can see your out of state plates.
I’m waiting for someone here to tell you that if you travel across state lines you’ll need to get a driver’s license from your destination state. If you’re married, how about a marriage license in each state - just to make sure. Of course, that’s ridiculous, as are the contentions that one state will not abide a legal vehicle from another state. Could you imagine the competition and loss of business and tourism if that was the case?
In NYS I expect the paper registration will disappear soon. You really don’t even need to carry your insurance card, since a piece of paper can be doctored to look legit even if it’s not.
Most police cars here are equipped with scanners that read a car’s license plate, connect to the DMV or RMV, and, within seconds, can tell the cop if your vehicle is registered and/or insured, if it was reported stolen, the description of the car, who owns the vehicle, etc. There’s no real need for a cop to ask for anything but your driver’s license.
As for insurance, most NYS motorists are required to carry insurance that provides coverage if you’re injured from an uninsured or under-insured motorist. I bet a lot of auto insurance companies offer this coverage and many states require it.
If you’re in compliance with your home state, there is no need to worry about crossing state lines.
Yeah, we went around this once before with practices in the UK. What is called the “registration” in the UK is called a “title” in the US. What we call the “registration” is similar to the “tax disc”, except that it’s usually a card kept in the glove box rather than a sticker on the windshield.
My WAG is that the laws were made many decades ago when paper was the only proof because computers weren’t around; and changing the laws to require all cops to look it up online means that all cops are required to equip their cars with computers, but not all jurisdictions may have the money for that.
Keeping the requirements for paper is cheaper for the cops, and possibly cheaper for the drivers, too: you don’t have to buy an electronic card as backup proof.
Seriously, you think you live in the Land of the Free* and* the Home of the Brave?
In most cases, police can stop you. If they have probably cause, they can search teh vehicle. In all cases, even routine “Stop everyone”, they can ask for license and registration. A court case a few years ago decided that you cannot refuse to identify yourself to a ploice officer doing an investigation. There’s a whole body of law on pedestrain stops and pat-downs with a much lower standard of cause than a full search.
We won’t get into “no knock” warrants, which have been standard for 30 plus years. Sorry if we got the wrong house…
Recall the story of one of the NHL players who was pulled over in the middle of a lake in Minnesota this summer; he blew clean on the breathalyzer, but was charged with Boating DUI when he told them he would not give a urine and blood sample - to cops or conservation officers in the middle of a lake! Apparently, another case of BWB - boating while black.
Meanwhile, back at the OP - many Canadian provinces also require you to have the registration in the vehicle. Generally, the cops are not dicks, and will either ignore the missing document or give you 48 hours to bring it down to the police station, although it is quite possible to provoke them into writing you a ticket. (Or some cops can be dicks for no reason) An acquaintance once was pulled over by the Ontario police with expired plates (it was not a good year financially for him). The policeman pointed out his expired registration and insurance, and he said “that’s my girlfriend in the car. We’re going to pick up her father at the airport. Whatever ticket or tow I get from you is nothing to what he’s gojng to say if we miss him and he finds out what happened…” The cop actually let him go with a warning! My guess is it was too close to shift change and he couldn’t be bothered waiting for the tow truck then filling out the piles of paperwork.
yes, all that stuff is available online. Cops used to just call the details in to the dispatcher. Now they have computers in the car.
As I’ve said before in this forum, you can try to politely explain things, but the officer can write a ticket for whatever he feels like. They’ll tell you that it is the court’s job to sort it out.
Most jurisdictions are reasonable about this. A small number consider this an easy source of revenue - if you’re passing through and will be hundreds of miles away at the time of your court date, they figure you’ll just mail back the ticket with a check rather than coming back to fight it. In the “old days”, you could simply ignore it, as long as you planned to never be in that area again. With the advent of the Non-Resident Violator Compact (and successors), that state will simply tell your state to suspend your license.
For more than any normal person wants to know, consult the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators web site.
Note that this reciprocity only applies to private vehicles, not commercial ones. The rules for commercial vehicles are far more complex and bizarre.
In California, it used to be required that you keep your registration secured to the steering wheel column. You bought a little flexible frame thing that attached to the column, and slipped the registration into it.
But then they realized that people would look into the window, see your address, figure this was evidence that you weren’t home, and would go to rob your house.