Adventure #2 - A Guide to Car Registration

Car registration is one thing that every car owner should give importance. Wikipedia says, the purpose of car registration is to establish clear ownership and to tax motorist or vehicle owners. Basically, it is the same as paying property tax for your house yearly.

When you buy a brand new car, most likely it is pre-registered for three years. Afterwards, you have to renew your registration yearly. I don't know if the 3-year pre-reg is a standard for brand new cars, but when I used to browse online for cars for sale, I always see that it is always part of the inclusions.

For new car owners, do you know how to determine when should you renew your car registration? Here in the Philippines, you can see it by looking at the last two digits of your car's plate number. The last digit corresponds to the month, while the second digit corresponds to the week you are scheduled.

For example, your plate number is ABC-123. You have to register on March because it's the 3rd month. If it ends with 0, you have to register on October.

To know which week of March you should go, take note of this:
1, 2, or 3 - 1st week
4, 5, or 6 - 2nd week
7or 8 - 3rd week
9 or 0 - 4th week

Therefore, based on the plate number above, you should register on the first week of March.

I also read online that you can renew your registration as early as one month ahead of your actual schedule. If you are always busy, however, you can still register after your schedule but you need to pay for late charges. Just don't let a year pass without registering because you still need to pay for the car's registration for the year you missed. So make sure to be have your car registered on schedule to avoid the hassle and the penalties.

Now that I have Getzy, I need to renew her registration. Here's the requirements for your reference:

First, bring original copies of Certificate of Registration (CR) and it's previous Official Receipt (OR). If you just bought a car, make sure to check these two documents and keep them in a safe place. If you are just applying for renewal, photocopies of the CR and OR will do.

Second, you need to pass an LTO accredited emission test center. My brother-in-law accompanied me to a test center along Mindanao Avenue for Getzy's emission testing. It cost us around Php450.

After the testing, we went to their auto shop to get Getzy's stencil. This step is part of the car registration form.

Finally, we had Getzy registered at LTO. It cost me Php 3800, for a total of Php4250. Thank God we didn't encounter any problems securing her registration. :)