Mississippi’s new automobile tag and title network goes live on Monday at the state Department of Revenue and at tax collectors’ offices around the state.
That doesn’t mean, however, that Leflore County’s system for buying and renewing tags will change immediately.
“We are not online yet,” Leflore County Tax Collector Annie Conley said on Friday. “People will be able to pay by phone for tags, or they will be able to go online and look at their records, and we’ll be part of that network when it’s all set up.
“But we’re going to wait about six months to see how the new system works out before going online.”
The new system is called MARVIN, which stands for Mississippi Automated Registration Vehicle Information Network. It will replace a network that’s been around since the early 1980s. The new internet-based system is touted by the Department of Revenue as “a state-of-the-art system whose functionality will benefit each county for vehicle registrations, revenue accounting and audit monitoring.”
That means functions such as calculating the amount of property taxes a county receives from motor vehicles will be automated. When departments are audited for collections, those records will be automated, too.
Additionally, vehicle owners are supposed to see a quicker turn-around time for securing titles under the new system.
MARVIN will link Mississippi with a nationwide system designed to prevent fraud and keep unsafe vehicles off the road, according to the state’s press release.
But there is a caveat: With the activation of a massive new software system, expect there to be glitches, the Department of Revenue warned in the same announcement.
“We ask for your patience as the county offices may experience longer than usual wait times during its first week,” the DOR notice said. “We expect any delays to be short-term.”
Conley chuckled when she heard that.
“I wondered if they would say that,” she said.
DOR promised it is working hard to mitigate potential problems by selecting a “user-friendly system,” demonstrating the software at county offices and providing training throughout the state.
Conley said she has not yet attended the training for MARVIN, though others in her office have. The Department of Revenue has been busily training bookkeepers, clerks and tax collectors around the state over the last year, as well as updating computer systems.
One hope for MARVIN was that the new vehicle registration system might help with stricter auto insurance enforcement. Mississippi law requires motorists to have liability insurance, but it’s estimated that at least a fourth of the state’s drivers are uninsured.
During the 2017 legislative session, a House proposal would have required motorists to show proof of liability insurance to renew their vehicle registration, and it was envisioned that MARVIN would be part of that verification process. The proposal, however, died in the Senate.
One of MARVIN’s advantages on which Conley and the state agree is that fees will no longer have to be hand-calculated with codes entered for each registrant. Instead, the system will now calculate fees for the tax-collecting offices.
“It will basically make our office a little simpler,” Conley said. “It will eliminate some paperwork.”
Under MARVIN, individuals will eventually be able to go into the system and renew their tag without going through the process of receiving paper notices and taking them to the tax collector’s office. Notices indicating that tags are due for renewal will be sent by email to those who opt for electronic renewal.
•Contact Kathryn Eastburn at 581-7235 or keastburn@gwcommonwealth.com.
