We’d had four lovely days of tourism, getting to walk around
and appreciate the country we had come to visit. I have to admit I’d enjoyed
the admin taking a back seat for a change, after the hectic times before
leaving the UK and getting immediately stuck in to more admin on arrival. Despite warnings from Tash and David about
the trials that lay ahead to insure and register our new vehicle, we had
enjoyed having a break and let it slide for a few days. But today there was no getting away from it –
if we were going to collect our RV tomorrow we would have to have insurance in
place and we wouldn’t get it registered without cover. Thinking it would be as easy as putting our
details into comparison websites to see what offers we could get, it soon
became apparent that as we didn’t have a home address, or another car, then
insurance companies were reluctant to cover us solely for a mobile home. One of the main issues expected at the
Registry of Motor Vehicles (RMV) was the fact that our pedantic friends in
Massachusetts only accept an insurance certificate (or temporary binder) with a
wet signature/stamp on it – i.e. not even an e-mailed, copied and scanned image
is acceptable. We hoped to avoid this
issue by using a local insurer who we could obtain a stamp off by visiting them
in person but this was beginning to look unlikely. They just didn’t want to
take the risk unless we were an existing customer or were looking for
additional insurance products. We even dropped into some local insurers in
person – we were not well received!
Just to clarify all this, because it’s SO different from
registering a vehicle in the UK, the things you need to register a vehicle and
legally drive it are:
- · An address in the U.S to register it to – and proof you are staying at that address (i.e name on a bill or rental agreement)
- · An insurance company prepared to give you Insurance. Once the policy has been agreed, you will be issued with an ‘Insurance Binder’ from them.
- · Also from them, you’ll need your RMV1 form (which is your application form to register a vehicle in your name) this needs to be the original document, stamped by the Insurance company WITH A WET STAMP! E-mails and scanned copies of it are not accepted.
- · A Bill of sale. This is paperwork given to you by the seller of the vehicle you are buying, confirming the sale has been agreed and the price being paid for it. It is from this bill that the R.M.V staff work out how much sales tax you owe.
- · Finally, you need to physically visit the R.M.V and show them the RMV1 form – complete with Insurers stamp, the Bill of Sale from the seller, the Insurance Binder and finally a proof of residence in that State. If it is all in order they’ll stamp the paperwork and give you a bill for the sales tax you now owe. Only once this has been paid in full will they then give you your registration plates, which you physically attach to your vehicle.
Of all the above, the only thing – but crucially the main
thing – that we had going for us, was that Tasha and David had agreed to let us
use their address for registering Insurance and the RV itself. I have no idea
how we could’ve proceeded otherwise. For this, we’ll be forever thankful to
them!
So, after an entire morning of failure we contacted Campers
Inn who had previously offered to assist us with getting an insurance
quote. It transpired that the only
companies that we would be able to get insurance through were RV specialist
firms but in a way, that was reassuring – they would be best placed to assist
us in the event of a breakdown or issue with our RV. The problem – the two companies we found were
based in California, so we had no chance of dropping by to get a wet signature
or official stamp! As we now know No stamp = No Registration and you’re back to
square one…
Also, having been promised a reasonable rate of insurance I
was thankful that I looked at the small print for a change – the nice, low
quote we received was great but clearly stated that if we were planning to use
our RV for 150 or more days in a year we would need to request an enhanced
quote. This took both of our quotes above $1000 for a year’s cover. We had no
choice, but at least we would be fully insured and the quotes included
breakdown assistance so time will tell how essential our cover is. But insurance is certainly an expensive
factor to consider when travelling to the USA, factoring in this RV cover in
addition to the enhanced travel and medical insurance you need! I tried
explaining that we didn’t need a full 12 months cover as we would only be in
the country until July next year, so could we pay monthly by instalments? Not
possible, unless you have a U.S bank account. Do you have one? …erm, No.
In the end we headed back to Campers Inn. We had to complete the bill of sale paperwork
we’d need at the RMV in any case and we decided to go with the Insurance quote
that our RV sellers had got us, in the hope that they should know what they
were doing more than us. The finance
director there was helpful. We sorted
the paperwork including the bill of sale and RMV1 form that we would need to
produce tomorrow having explained our concerns about the registration… and the
stamp! In a direct call with our insurers, we were assured that the scanned,
stamped RMV1 form they sent to Campers Inn who printed it for us, would be
accepted at the RMV. We weren’t overly convinced but, as a back-up, in addition
to e-mailing the completed form to us they would also over-night the original signed form by Fed-ex so that
if the printed version wasn’t accepted we would have that by the middle of the
day. It was water-tight. However, Dave
the finance manager did explain that we were trying to register a vehicle in
the state that makes it the most difficult, a comment for which we were extremely
grateful!
On to the issue of the money owed to us by Campers Inn due
to our over-payment for the RV – would we accept a cheque? No, we have nowhere
to pay it in. Couldn’t they just repay it to my UK bank account? Or how about
cash? No, they don’t hold that amount of cash. The solution? We needed to stock
up on RV stuff for our new home but were clueless as to what we’d actually
need. So, we hit Campers Inn store with a sales advisor helping us with the
essentials for any RV owner – various hoses for water & sewage, blocks for
levelling out your mobile home, biodegradable toilet paper, chemicals for
different systems etc. We then used as much of our overpayment as possible to
get a fold-out table, chairs and a BBQ.
Our goods were piled into a trolley and left parked in the service area
that night, ready for us to collect the next day. Despite our best efforts we
were still owed a couple of hundred dollars so we agreed to ask David if he
would cash the cheque if made out to him and give us the cash. We left Campers Inn in buoyant mood – our new
RV along with tons of goodies was waiting there for us. We had the paperwork to
prove we were the owners and had the necessary insurance to hit the road. All we needed to do was overcome the RMV system
to get our plates and we were there.
Back in Westford that evening David painstakingly went
through the RMV online advice with us in preparation for the next day. We got all of our paperwork together and
thought about possible hurdles to overcome.
Was the stamp official enough?
Could we prove residence in Massachusetts? We printed out our phone
bills showing our US address in Westford, and we even had Simon’s speeding
ticket as back-up! We had our new insurance certificate showing our address in
the USA. Would that be enough? Another
issue – valid payment method. Other
items in the RMV could be paid for on credit card. We worked out we needed to pay roughly $3500(!)
in sales tax with registration fees on top… and their website stated they
wouldn’t accept credit card! Only cash, money order or cheque. I reassured myself that there must be room
for exceptions – I could offer to transfer the money direct to a relevant
account. Surely a one-off payment via
credit card would suffice when no other payment method was available to us for
such a large amount? We braced ourselves for the next day and got an early
night so that we would be on our best form.
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