The Mississippi Senate recently passed the auto-insurance verification bill wherein it forces the state’s residents to comply with the Mississippi insurance laws. The bill is set to face a legislative deadline soon.
The bill introduces a new program that allows the use of computer technology in verifying the coverage of liability insurance for the Department of Revenue and Insurance Department and the Department of Public Safety. For motorists who do not have insurance policies, they will be facing penalties such fines that can go as high as $500 or suspension of their licenses. Vehicle license plates tags can also be denied to uninsured drivers by tax assessors and collectors.
According to the Chairman of the Senate Insurance Committee Eugene Clarke, R-Hollandale, the testing period for the said bill will start on July 1, 2012. He further claims that this will allow the Legislature of 2012 to do a further review of the bill.
In the Senate, the bill underwent a few minor changes. These changes include removing the random checking of motorists to check if they are covered by insurance policies or not. The appeal process for those who are claimed to be offenders was also included by the Senate. For representative Hank Zuber of Ocean Springs, he does not see any problem with the changes that were made by the Senate on the bill.
With the bill, the Department of Public Safety is authorized to set fines for drivers who are not compliant which can be $50 to $500. These fines that are collected will be used for paying the expenses of the computer technology that will be used for assessing the drivers and their insurance policies. Private contractors will be assigned to maintain the electronic database. For the amounts that were left from the payments made, these will be used to help in reducing the costs of license plate tags.