QCOSTARICA – Without a national vehicle inspection service in operation, the question of payment of the annual circulation permit, the Marchamo, that the national insurer – the Instituto Nacional de Seguros (INS) – that starts collection on November 1, is being discussed in all corners of the country.
By law, a vehicle must have the RTV (vehicular techinical inspection), commonly referred to as “riteve” for the name of the company that provided the service for the last twenty years, until this past July 15, when its contract expired and not renewable, to get the “sticker”.
To be clear, the Marchamo can be paid directly at any INS office at any time, RTV inspection of not. However, to get the sticker required for circulation, the vehicle has to have passed the corresponding inspection.
This year that is not possible, given that the government’s plan to have had a new inspection service in place by now has been delayed due to appeals. At the end of August, the Minister of the Ministry of Public Works and Transport (MOPT), Luis Amador, announced it had awarded the temporary contract to the German company, DEKRA, whose operations would be in place by this month.
This leaves tens of thousands of vehicle owners up in the air and no way to get their vehicles inspected, and thus to pay the Marchamo and circulate legally. These are owners (and drivers) of vehicles with license plates ending in 1, 2, 3 and 4 and do not have the ‘riteve’ sticker, that is did not or could not get the vehicle inspection within the prescribed time.
For the rest, that is owners (and drivers) of vehicles with license plates ending in 5, 6, 7, 8, 9 and 0, they have been granted an amnesty. That is they continue to legally drive despite not having the corresponding RTV certificate and sticker.
For this group, the INS confirmed that they will be able to pay the 2023 Marchamo and get the ‘sticker’ even though they do not have the RTV, meaning they can continue to circulate legally until such time as the RTV inspection is available.
The MOPT has a specific time frame allowment for such: one month after the restart of the inspection service for vehicles with plates ending in 5 and 6, two months for 7 & 8, and three months for 9 & 0.
As the INS pointed out, all is possible as long as the amnesty applied by the MOPT remains in force due to the delay with the DEKRA company to start this service.
For the others (plates ending in 1, 2, 3 and 4) that did not get the inspection before the Riteve closing, they can pay the Marchamo but won’t get the sticker and when the inspection service resumes they can simply apply the new sticker.
However, they are subject to fines and/or confiscation of plates and/or vehicle by a traffic official while driving on a public road.
The MOPT continues to hold the line that DEKRA will be operational by mid-October.
