Mike Linacres's
explanation for red on white sticker.
Information
below brought to you by Mike Linacre of Haslett, Michigan
Let me tell you what I know
and what I've seen recently. As
most of you know, Michigan now uses a single month/year sticker. The
1999
colors are black on orange, and 2000 is black on teal. Last
December, I decided to get a vanity plate for my car. When I got the
plate
in the mail in January, I was quite suprised to see separate month
and year stickers. Furthermore, the
year sticker was red on white! I
called the local Secretary of State office and asked if this was a
mistake or if it would cause a problem.
After being transferred four times,
I was told that the dual stickers would be no problem (they
seemed to "ignore" my question about if
it was a mistake.) Since that time,
I've seen a few other vanity plates with the red on white
00. I've also seen them with the single black/teal sticker. I've
also seen separate month and year stickers,
with the year sticker the current
black/teal. Just to make future collecting more interesting, I
saw a car a the grocery store a month ago
that had an 11/99 sticker, but this
sticker was black/teal instead of black/orange!
I suspect there will be more of these inconsistencies
in the future. With Michigan's new
sticker system, the stickers are printed for you at the
local SoS offices. However, you can also get your renewals via mail
or fax, so those stickers come from the
main office here in Lansing. I can
easily imagine the local offices messing things up (like using the
wrong color sticker, etc.) All
I can say is that Michigan plate collecting may be VERY interesting
in the future.
Follow-up
explanation by Joe Ross of Potterville, Michigan
The "red on white" stickers are valid and
are not an error. These were
originally issued starting in 1997 for plate with a 5 year expiration
(non-profit organization, historical vehicle).
The color scheme is what we *would*
have used for all tabs had Michigan not gone to laser printers in
the Secretary of State branch offices.
The laser-printed tabs are the black on
teal (aka green) format. Why the color
change? It's because the laser printers can only print with black
toner at present. The toner is a
special heat sensitive type that fuses with
a chemical on the tab material to keep the lettering from rubbing off.
You should be able to rub the tab hard
with your thumb and the lettering should
not come off. For the background color, the tab stock comes in about
16 shades. Unfortunately most are
too dark to allow the black printing to show
well (something law enforcement officers tend to like). There's onlys
For Michigan's Renewal by Mail, Internet
Renewal, and Touch tone telephone renewal
programs, the tabs are printed by a main-frame based laser printer
on a different form than the branch offices
use. However, the layout of the tab
is the same as the branch issued tabs. But
personalized and some of the special purpose plates (such as in-transit
repair, manufacturer, transporter) are
produced in a different manner. For personalized,
the registration are printed in Lansing, before the plates are manufactured
in Adrian. The registrations are matched with the plates just
before mailing. Because the ordering
system prints the old type registration,
the old stock of tabs are used with these plates. The old tabs
only show the year; therefore a month tab is included to keep the law
enforcement types from hassling you.
In fact, most branch offices returned their
stock of month tabs to Renewal by Mail (who sends the plates) for this
purpose. The Department of State
is working on a service request to print personalized
plate tabs the same way as the Renewal by Mail tabs, but with Y2K
testing and new legislation with October 1 effective dates, it will
probably be next year before the tabs all
match. So if the 2000 tab on a personalized
plate is white with red, that means the person
has a new personalized plate that was purchased sometime after Aug 1,
1998. If there's a teal with black
print on the plate, the person has had the
configuration for a while and renewed it at a branch office or by mail,
web, or phone. As
far as the 11/99 tab on green stock, I believe you guessed correctly.
Someone at the branch probably put the
wrong form in the printer and printed the
tab on the wrong background. Odds are the driver renewed the plate
late, when 2000 renewals were abounding
and the branch did not notice the mistake.
BTW, Mike Sells, on your web site, the
trailer and vehicle green with black tabs
are the same; the main difference is the plate number prints in the
fine print at the upper right of the tab.
The codes at the bottom tell the branch
and day the tab was issued. The same stock is used for both.
This information brought to you by Joe
Ross of Potterville, Michigan
