Car tags change to new system
Mississippi is changing its vehicle registration system from Legacy to MARVIN, according to Marshall County tax collector Betty Byrd.
The switch-over took place October 9, after closing out on the Legacy system Friday, Oct. 6, she said.
Anytime there is a new software system to become familiar with, it means county employees have to live with any glitches in the new system until it is debugged.
“Even though there are 82 counties in the State of Mississippi, there are 104 tax collector offices,” Byrd said. “I am very proud to say Marshall County is fortunate to have two offices to better serve its citizens.”
The state went to a computer system for registering and titling vehicles back in the 1980s.
“The Legacy system has been in operation ever since,” Byrd said. “You can imagine how antiquated it is by now. On Friday, Oct. 6, at 5:30 p.m. Legacy shut down for good. We woke up Monday with the Mississippi Automated Registration Vehicle Information Network (MARVIN).”
Byrd said the state has been testing and training for MARVIN for two years.
“The bottom line is that all counties have to be in compliance in order to sell a tag or title a vehicle,” Byrd said. “This new system is completely different from anything we have ever used.”
MARVIN is connected to the National Motor Vehicle Title Information System which carries the complete history of any vehicle moving to Marshall County. NMVTIS should help identify branded or stolen vehicles, which benefits law enforcement, as well.
All application forms for titles and tags will be printed at the Marshall County tax office. MARVIN will help the office keep track of tag inventories and the office will automatically receive more tags when inventory runs low.
Byrd said she is very excited about this new system and she commended her staff members, who have all attended training programs and webinars and double entered each transaction (entering tag or title data on both Legacy and MARVIN). This has given the office staff experience on the new system.
Byrd said October 9 was an exciting day but also scary. Every county goes live at once.
The bugs will be worked out of the system in the early days or weeks of use.
Byrd asked for patience while any problems are resolved.
She said tags are usually changed every five years in the month of October. But that will be put on hold and the state will start issuing new tags with a new mask in October 2018. Any new tags issued between now and next October will have the same guitar mask but will have seven letters and numbers instead of the current six.