E-renewals Growing Every Year

Boat registration renewals have been offered as an online service in Ohio since 2001 and the service is growing in popularity every year.

“We started with just under 3000 registrations being renewed back in 2001. That’s grown to over 10,000 in 2007,” says Rick Barrera, Registration Manager for ODNR Watercraft. “We anticipate more people using online renewal as they get more comfortable with the Internet. And we’re trying to increase the number of people who can take advantage of it.”

Online renewal originally spanned six months – from January through June. When the boating season was delayed one year due to a longer, colder spring, the Division decided to extend renewals through the summer. Enough people had renewed at the end of summer to make it a permanent change to the online renewal schedule.

In the first version of online renewal, boat owners could only renew one registration per credit card transaction, which made for lots of unnecessary typing. “We know that the typical Ohio boat owner has more than one boat, so entering all that information twice was wasting time for a lot of people. Now you can renew many boats in one credit card transaction.”

Alternative Registrations (a different style of decal for hand-powered boats that costs a little extra) were added to the online renewal mix in 2005. And in 2007, lapsed renewals were included – those are the registrations that boat owners choose not to renew the year they expire, but are renewed one or two years later.

Now, if your boat registration from as far back as 2006 wasn’t renewed at all, if you still have the Personal Identification Number (PIN) associated with that boat, you can renew it online.

“Since boat registrations are on a three-year cycle,” explains Barrera, “we’ll keep those PINs active until the boat comes up in the cycle again. So you can renew [registrations from 2006 or 2007] online this year as long as you have your PIN.”

Another reason for using online renewal is that your registration gets printed on a plastic, wallet-size card. The card is meant to be a convenience for boaters, who are required by law to carry the registration on board their boat.

Future plans for expanding the audience for online renewals around the state include the independent registration agents, who currently use hard copy forms.

“When we get [agents] online, the boater can walk out with a card-style registration, and all the tracking of that registration is done electronically. We get the system updated immediately and there are fewer opportunities for error. I think everybody will win in that situation,” says Barrera.

For now, though, renewing in person means getting a paper registration (unless you renew at one of the 12 Watercraft offices or one of a few state park offices across the state). The first batch of renewal letters was mailed January 7th, so if you have a boat that is up for renewal, look for yours in the mail soon.

You can read more about boat registrations in the “Registration” section of this ODNR Watercraft website.