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Hundreds Wait In Long Lines To Avoid Fee Increases
September 1, 2009
People stood in line for hours Monday to renew their tags or driver’s licenses on the last day to save some green. The fees for vehicle registrations, renewals, titles and driver licenses have all increased — some more than double — effective today.
So many people tried to avoid the fee increase on Friday that Department of Highway Safety and Motor Vehicles computer systems crashed. On Monday, hundreds of people lined up at Escambia County Tax Collector offices. Some waited well over two hours. In Cantonment and on W Street in Pensacola, drive-through windows were closed because traffic backed up into the highways.
Thousands of people across the state turned to the Internet to renew their tags and licenses, but that was not a time-saver for most. The state’s gorenew.com was down for most of the day, returned nothing or error messages.
“It’s almost like they did it on purpose to make us pay more,” one NorthEscambia.com wrote in an email. “They are doing anything they can to make us pay more. People can’t afford this right now; we should be able to at least pay online.”
Tax Collector Janet Holley’s office issued rain checks Friday and Monday to those unable to renew in person due to the computer problems. The rain checks are good for the current lower fees until September 10.
The New Fees Effective September 1
The initial registration fee – the fee paid for a vehicle registration on an additional vehicle not replacing a current vehicle — jumped from $100 to $225.
Tag and registration fees went up as much as 66 percent; the exact amount depends on the weight of the vehicle. Transfer fees for titles more than doubled from $29.75 to $75.75. Motorcycle registrations also increased, from $24.60 to $41.65.
Reinstating a suspended driver license increased, late payment fees on driver license renewals went up 15-fold, from $1 to $15, and the cost of the original driver license went from $32.25 to $54.25. Renewing a driver license went from $25.25 to $54.25.
Holley stressed that the increases were mandated by the state legislature for all Florida residents; the increases are not specific to Escambia County. For more information, contact Holley’s office at (850) 438-6500 ext. 252.
Comments
11 Responses to “Hundreds Wait In Long Lines To Avoid Fee Increases”
You guys are blaming the wrong person. Janet Holley didn’t do this…this came from Tallahassee. I agree with S.L.B. who decided on this increase and why wasn’t the people of Florida allowed to have their say. Florida is getting a little too expensive for the regular people.
Driving is an expensive privelidge. If you want to drive , pay up. If not theres a 3 dollar bus ride.
Oh yeah, like VOTING resolves everything! Politicians say one thing to our faces when they are running for election or re-election, but after it’s all said and done and their in, all of a sudden they get amnesia and do or say just the opposite.
Money talks….everything else walks!
That is the reason for anger and attitudes of people today as we cannot trust anyone or depend on anything anymore. Not to mention the STRESS of trying to keep up daily with new tax increases, rate increases, cost of living demands coming at you everyday you wake up and worrying if you will even have a job tomorrow in order to pay for everything. And if you dont have a job and cannot find a job, then how do you pay…out your butte?
Everywhere we turn around, it seems someone is trying to figure out how they can get more out of the tax payers pockets, as if we are overflowing in wealth here in Florida or anywhere else for that matter.
My main gripe is how we did not have a say so or vote in this Florida Tax Collectors issue. And what angers me even more is that they didn’t charge us a reasonable increase rate, they slapped us with double and triple rates with an unreasonable deadline. Where’s the justice in that?
T…. I agree with you. I tried to pay it online and could not, but I am not going to kick and scream. I am sure Janet Holley and her staff would have been happy if the 50 people waiting to get in Monday morning on HWY 29 could have paid online. I will write the big check in November and accept responsibility for not familiarizing myself with the new changes sooner. This fee increase should lead more people to voice their “anger” by voting the next time the representative in our districts that voted for this increase is up for re-election. Let’s send the message to them. Maybe William would kindly do a story on how this increase originated, was proposed and passed.
Does complaining change anything? Really? No. I wasn’t able to renew my DL online either because the site was down, but oh well. Life goes on. Wonder why the kids of this generation act the way they do: they are acting just like their parents!!!!! Such a wonderful hope for the future.
You guys in Florida are lucky because at least you can renew your license or tags over the Internet. Alabama’s still 10 years behind.
Molino Resident – The Tax Collector is not going to hand you a golden invitation to renew your tag or drivers license.
It’s not the Tax Collectors job to make things easier for you. She does it because she wants to help her constituents, not because she has to.
With that being said, maybe you borrowed BMM’s glasses. The State’s system went down. Janet Holley doesn’t control the state.
BMM, Apparently you only skimmed the article as it clearly states – “The state’s goenew.com was down for most of the day”
It’s funny how everyone is so quick to blame someone else for their own faults. As a business owner you should be well aware of what waiting until the last minute can do.
I agree with BMM. I was unable to renew because of the online system failing as well… not because of poor planning on my part. They should have planned for increased traffic. They knew to expect this and I feel that they have failed us. Not everyone has the time or resources to go pay their fees in person. Not to mention, (ummm, this one is for you) many of us were not aware of the public service annuoncement fron July 23rd.
If you ask the, the poor planning falls on the Tax Collectors shoulders.
I will be stuck paying the higher fee. I have tried since Friday to pay my tag renewal online and was not able to. I have my own business so I would have had to close my store to go stand in line for several hours which would have cost me even more.
I did not fail to plan, I planned on paying before the end of the month just like I always do, ONLINE. It is not my fault the Tax Collectors system failed and was unable to support the increased demand for the online service. It appears to me the Tax Collectors plan failed since they did not allow for the increased traffic they surely knew would be coming, both online and in person.
Give me a break people.
Janet Holley is an elected public official. She wouldn’t raise fees, break the computers to get higher fees or do anything that would cause the very people she depends on more strife.
Janet Holley’s office put out a public service announcement on July 23, 2009 (http://ectc.co.escambia.fl.us/uploads/2009FeeIncreasePressReleasewFlyer.pdf) that explained in detail the fees, rules and regulations of these increases. You had plenty of time.
Failure to plan on your part does not necessitate an emergency on the Tax Collector’s part.