License plates for cars registered from July 2016 to February 2017 are now available. The Land Transportation Office urged car owners to claim their plates and attach these to their cars or face a fine of P5,000. |CDN FILE PHOTO
Car owners who fail to attach their official plates on their vehicles will be held liable by the Land Transportation Office (LTO-7).
LTO Regional Director Victor Caindec said they will issue citation tickets to violators.
“In the event that you’ll commit a traffic violation and LTO personnel will apprehend you, we will check your license plate. If you fail to attach it even if your plate number is already available, then you’ll be asked why you didn’t attach your license plate,” he said.
Earlier, LTO said more than 23,000 license plates are now available for vehicles that were registered from July 2016 to February 2017.
However, records show that only 10,000 license plates were claimed by car owners since the LTO started the release of the license plates last July.
“(Upon apprehension) if they say that they were not able to claim their newly issued plate numbers even if it’s already available, then that’s not an excuse, they will be penalized,” he added.
According to Caindec failure to attach proper license plates carries a fine of P5,000.
“But let me clarify. We will not be conducting operations against vehicles with no proper plate numbers. But if you’ll commit a traffic violation, possession of original license plate will be among the items that will be checked,” Caindec explained.
Caindec urged car owners to coordinate with their car dealers in claiming their license plate.
Car owners need only to give a written authorization to their dealers, who will be the ones to attach the license plate. They can also check if their license plate is already available online by visiting the LTO official website, www.lto.gov.ph.
Caindec said LTO has over 200 deputized LTO, Philippine National Police (PNP) and Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH)
personnel.