July 15, 2020
Getting the C5 on the road sure is complex here in Quebec Canada!
Whenever one purchases a car outside of Quebec and wants to plate it here, there are basically three steps that one has to complete.
- One has to go to a license bureau and pay all provincial taxes, receive your license plate (which is totally useless at this point) and a 1-day transit.
- One has to get the car safety certified by an authorized location.
- One has to go back to the license bureau, pay the (in my case) big engine tax and licensing fees
Now, don’t forget, we’re still deep in the COVID-19 pandemic, so everything is done by appointment only, and everything takes longer to happen. We had to make an appointment to pay the taxes at a license bureau. The local one was booked for 3 weeks in advance but my sister found one in Montreal that had a spot available a bit earlier. We had to find the local authorized safety certification center (a 15 min drive from our home), and finally we had to go back to the license bureau (not the same one, because that one now had a 3 week waiting list), in my town for the third and final part of the process.
Step #1 (pay taxes and get transit and plates) happened in Montreal and an interesting thing was that everyone waited in a line outside spaced out appropriately and “socially distanced”, all wearing masks. We did too. That process took about 1.5 hours thanks to some banking issues that were resolved by calling them up and setting them straight.
Step #2 was my favorite part, because that meant I had to drive the ‘Vette to the certified safety inspection center (using that stupid 1-day temporary paper license plate), which turned out to be a Mazda dealership a few towns over. I had an absolute blast driving there and back and I was pacing nervously as their mechanic drove my car away to spend an hour inspecting it thoroughly. When it came back, they had absolutely ZERO comments in the “requires attention” section of the report and a surprise comment from the mechanic that was “really nice car, sir!”. I then got to drive it back home and had to wait yet again to the appointment date for step 3.
A few days later, Step #3 was to go to another local license bureau, pay for the registration and “big engine” tax, after that, I got home, plated the car and went for my first drive, which was nothing less than amazing and at that moment, the culmination of the entire process and 47 years of waiting all came to an end as officially this dream of mine came true!
So… how long did the process take? From the day that I unloaded the car from the carrier to the moment I placed the license plates on the car… 18 long, torturous days… but it was so worth it!