According to the Maryland Motor Vehicle Administration (MVA), when you register or renew a vehicle's registration you sign an insurance certification form. Your signature on this acknowledges that the minimum vehicle liability insurance will be maintained throughout the registration period.

The MD auto insurance law requires that all motor vehicles registered be insured and carry coverage of 20/40/15. This includes motorcycles which is considered a motor vehicle and not a recreational or seasonal vehicle.

If you had turned in the license plates and registration card when you canceled your insurance and stored the motorcycle and then re-registered and got new insurance on bike when you were ready to ride it again, then you would not have been found to have a lapse in insurance.

Typically in Maryland when you cancel insurance on a registered vehicle the insurance company informs the MVA and they send you a notice of a lapse in insurance. It would appear the last few years the MVA was not informed when you canceled insurance or failed to notice the lapse.

Besides fines or penalties imposed by the court for being uninsured, the MVA has penalty fees of $150 for the first 30 days and $7 each day thereafter. To restore the registration there is a $25 fee.

The MVA should be able to tell you what you can do to get your registration on your motorcycle reinstated and what type of insurance you need to get to make this possible. It is doubtful that you could get retroactive insurance back to the date that you canceled insurance so you will likely need to get a new Maryland insurance policy on it and face the penalties imposed for the time without it.

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