DMV facilitates the claim of money that owes car owners

From Byrhonda LyonsCalmness

This story was originally published by CalmattersS Register about their ballots.

For years, the California Department of Motor vehicles maintains profits from the sales of towed cars without giving the owners a great chance to ask for money, which is reasonable.

This is changing, thanks to the SalMatters investigation.

State DMV already offers a tool to search for its website, which allows people to see if DMV owes them money from what is known as a bet. The instrument is almost identical to the one created for Calmatters our story In March.

By law, withdrawal companies, storage and car repair yards can sell your car to recover their costs if you don’t get your car. It is known as a bet.

For poor Californians, weights and combination fees are often a trap. Police can pull your car for things like Expired registrationBut you may not be able to return it if you cannot renew your registration because you have unpaid fees and fines of things like traffic and parking tickets.

Bet sales must be approved by DMV, and any residual money should go to the agency. Usually, detention sales end in debt. Calmatters, however, found that DMV had raised over $ 8 million out of nearly $ 5,300 auctioned between 2016 to the fall of 2024.

The owners are entitled to this surplus and have up to three years to ask for it. But the Agency does not notify the owners of the refund.

When our first story is running, the agency said it is not required to notify people of their recovery and it is not mentioned how people can claim to be restored to a bet. Now, in addition to The search toolThere is a list of Frequently asked questions And instructions on how to request a refund.

DMV also said he had sent more than $ 5,000 to a family after admitting that he had wrongly refused the request to recover Steven McAlighter, which was included in the Calmatters investigation.

“I would know nothing about this money without a call from you,” he said. “I think there are many people in the same situation and that money means a lot to them.”

His sister Joan McAllister, the vehicle, raised $ 1113 in San Francisco parking tickets in 2022 while she was hospitalized. Stephen said someone had found her “wandering the streets.”

In the end, the vehicle is towed and accumulated over $ 8,300 for storage fees.

Stephen tried to intervene, but he had no legal body. By the time he was appointed her conservative, the toward had sold her car, he said.

Mcallister has requested a refund of DMV shortly after our history is running. A few months later, the department refused its application. He reached out to Calmatters and I contacted DMV. Agency spokesman Ronald Ongtoabok apologized and said the refusal was a “mistake”.

DMV sent the check to her mansion. Mcalist, a property administrator, said he recently received the restoration.

“I felt they had deleted me and that they were doing it for many people,” he said.

Asked what he would do with the money, McAlighter replied that he plans to donate it to Calmatters.

“I think you guys do a really good job,” he said. “I think you could use this money much better than I could.”

This article was Originally Published on CalMatters and was reissued under Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Noderivatives License.