>The DMV in my state requires you make an appointment 4-6 months out right now. Walk-in appointments are unavailable or only available during a few hours a few days a week, if they happen to have staff that day. Good luck if you have your drivers license stolen.

Sounds like your state has a big problem.

In my state (New York), appointments are generally available within a week and walk-ins are welcome, but those with appointments get priority.

I've never spent more than 30 minutes or so at a NY DMV location and most transactions are available online, including replacement of lost/stolen licenses.

In fact, I decided on Wednesday (11 May 2022) that I wanted to trade in my license for an "Enhanced Driver's License"[0] (EDL) which, among other things, will be required for domestic air travel[1] in a year or so.

That's one of the few transactions that must be done in person. I went online to book an appointment and was presented with a whole bunch of appointment times next week. I chose Thursday (19 May 2022) as it worked best with my schedule, but I could have gone on the 16th if I'd wanted.

So, no. Not all DMVs are a pain or inefficient. Want to make that better in your state? Elect people who will work for you. Just a crazy thought.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enhanced_driver's_license

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/REAL_ID_Act

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>An EDL is not required to fly domestically, which is good because only 5 states offer the option. An EDL includes the Real ID benefits which includes domestic travel, but also acts as a passport when traveling by land or sea with Canada/Mexico/some Caribbean nations.

Yep. Which is why I said:

   ...I wanted to trade in my license for an "Enhanced
   Driver's License"[0] (EDL) which, *among other things*,
   will be required for domestic air travel[1] in a year or 
   so.

Upon reflection, I can see how that kind of puts the cart before the horse, but it isn't really incorrect as an EDL incorporates the RealID.

I suppose I could have clarified that the EDL provides RealID and additional functionality as you describe, but I figured that "among other things" and links describing both RealID and EDL, folks could find out for themselves what "among other things" meant.

Perhaps that overestimates the reading comprehension of some folks, but I prefer to give people the benefit of the doubt and not assume they're morons.

Perhaps that's a mistake, but if so, it isn't my first and won't be my last.

I thank you for clarifying and I'm sure the morons out there will thank you for your pedantry as well.

I'd further point out that this was just a real-life example of a service which must be provided in person and not online and my experience with scheduling an appointment. It could just as easily have been any of several different services which require actually going to the DMV, but that's the one that is relevant to my life at the moment.

As such, even if I'd claimed that an EDL gets me free blowjobs at Federal buildings, I still made the point I was attempting to make.

Edit: Clarified my prose.

WTF? This must be because of willful political sabotage?

The license plate should follow the car and ownership should be changed online as part of the transaction. It sounds incredibly wasteful that every time a car changes ownership the seller must hand over the plates in person to the DMV. And is there no national registry of cars or data sharing between states? Strange that a car can be registered twice.

If your drivers license is stolen you should be able to just order a new one online and have it delivered in the mail. I have been inside the building of our DMV equivalent two times. One time when I did theoretical exam to be allowed a practical driving test, and once for the driving test. I got a temporary license when I passed and the proper license in the mail the next week. This was 20 years ago.

The ultimate proof of ownership is a piece of paper.

You can do a lot of stuff electronically in my state, transferring a title isn't one of them.

Additional fun thing is that the buyer is supposed to go do that and it can cause the seller headaches if they don't.

Some states now have digital titles … no paper.

> WTF? This must be because of willful political sabotage?

It's not sabotage, it's the fact that the government wants a leash on you. I had an experience in the past with the CA DMV where simply forgetting to "de-register" a broken, non-functional motorcycle resulted in the state levying my bank account for hundreds of dollars in registration fees. The FTB had the money debited right out of my account, no different than if someone committed wire fraud.

I have to assume that you don't live in the US. The license plate can't always follow the car: each state has its own license plate(s) and DMV and rules, etc. e.g., I got a nastygram from New York state when I moved out of state and didn't turn in my plates. OTOH, in Minnesota, they tell you to do whatever you want with them: turn them in, throw them out in the recycling, etc. Some people have license plate collections on their garage walls.

If a license is stolen, You need to go into the DMV because they'll have to take a new photo. There was a temporary exception due to COVID, but I think that's no longer available since I had to go into the office when my license expired.

>The license plate should follow the car and ownership should be changed online as part of the transaction. It sounds incredibly wasteful that every time a car changes ownership the seller must hand over the plates in person to the DMV.

There's too many personalized plates and other exceptions in the US to make that viable.

The plates go with the vehicle in California most of the time. It just gets complicated when you sell to someone out of state because you have to turn the plates in yourself. If you a used car in CA, it's not unusual for the plates to be the same plates the car had since it was first registered in the state.

We bought our last family car from enterprise and one day this family walked by while my mom was waiting for me in the store parking lot. The kid recognized our car as a rental they had on a road trip once and got excited about it. Awkward. xD

Custom plates are weird. You can either give them to the new owner or transfer them to another vehicle or return them to the DMV.

Do you know how'd it'd work for plates like ham radio ones where you CAN'T transfer them to another another person, but it'd also make no sense to turn them in? Can you keep them to use on another car eventually?

This whole "turn in the plates or we'll go after you for not having insurance" seems completely insane. I've never turned in plates and no one's cared.

You actually can do that, I had to dig around to find the page lol.

https://www.dmv.ca.gov/portal/handbook/vehicle-industry-regi...

Some plates have retention fees, some don't. YMMV.

Except that’s exactly how it works in many states. If you want to keep your personalized plate, you have to jump through hoops, but it defaults to go with the car in the two states I’ve lived in.

Interesting, it's actually not allowed in the 3 states I've registered a car in. In NJ, they wouldn't even allow transferring a regular plate from our old volvo (registered in my dad's name) to our new town and country (registered in my mom's), because they were owned by different people as far as the state was concerned.

That's an awful setup. More states need to get DMV mostly online. I just go to their website when I sell my car and tell them I've sold it. No sending back plates (which is good, I keep my plates when I sell a car, because I like them).

What state is this? I always thought it was illegal to drive on public roads without insurance, not simply own an uninsured vehicle. From the farm, to the drag strip to the 4x4 trail, tons of people own uninsured vehicles that are not driven on public roads.

Which state? I’ve lived all over and never witnessed anything this bad

California right?

I have bought 3 used cars and gotten 2 teenagers thru permit and drivers test and license. Never had any appointments except for the driving test, and never had any long waits. All waits were much shorter than when I transferred my out of state license to CA in 2008 or 2009. Impressively well run bureaucracy, I'd say. And this with covid precautions to work around. Much better than the several east coast states I had prior experience with.

Now I do chose the office to visit with some care, and also (as an "elite WFH software engineer") time it so that the lines are likely to be shorter, so YMMV.

Can't be, in CA you can't return normal plates, they explicitly don't want them back. And you don't really have to return vanity plates either.

Rather, there's an online form for notifying them of a sale.

You definitely can return plates in California. They just don’t ask for them as a due course for any normal processes. But, you can choose to mail them in or turn them over to the clerk.

Please don't still your car to carvana. They are destroying private party used car sales in many communities around the country.

If they’re paying the highest price (and have the greatest convenience) to buy an asset I’m selling, they’re going to be the proud new owner. Same story if Blackrock wants to bid the most on my house.

If they have a better mousetrap, good for them. If they don’t and are just overpaying for cars, well, good for me.

How are they doing that?