News in 2018

In August the National Auto Auction Association (NAAA) issued a cautionary bulletin to its members alerting them to new practices in at least four states that could impact the value of their inventory. At issue is a new practice in Ohio, Virginia, Nevada and Wyoming of reclassification of vehicles that previously had clean titles to a salvage brand.

For example, if a vehicle with an Indiana title is sold and retitled in Ohio, it is possible that any junk, salvage, and insurance (JSI) reporting of that vehicle to the National Motor Title Information System (NMVTIS) in Indiana can result in Ohio noting or branding the previously clean title as salvage.

One of the challenges for automobile dealers revolves around the fact that definitions of salvage and junk differ between jurisdictions and the federal definition that triggers reporting can also be different. According to the NAAA’s bulletin, an explanation from NMVTIS stated:

“The Department of Justice recognizes that many state laws have differing requirements and definitions of terms such as ‘junk’ and ‘salvage.’ The NMVTIS requirements do not alter these state laws and the state laws do not prevail over federal definitions and requirements. The information reported to NMVTIS is not required to be used by any future state that titles a vehicle included in an auto recycler, junk or salvage yard report.”

In some states, the reporting of JSI data does not necessarily prevent the vehicle from being sold and issued a clean title. So dealers may have current inventory or may be presented with a possible trade-in, that could be impacted in these states.

What’s the solution? ADD offers all of its corporate customers easy access to NMVTIS through its TitleCheck report. Dealers can run reports on their entire inventory using ADD’s batch process and then maintain a current historical record with its single query process as trade-ins are presented.

For more information on TitleCheck NMVTIS reports and other services offered through ADD, email ADD at info@add123.com or call one of their friendly and knowledgeable customer service representatives at 855-300-3455 , 8 AM to 8 PM EST. Se habla español.