Puerto Rico Veteran Vehicle Taxes, Fees and Parking

Article 4C, Third, of Ley 203-2007 collects the vehicle benefits, and there are five of them at different eligibility levels. The first is the one almost nobody mentions and it reaches every veteran. Half off the marbete. "Los veteranos tendrán un descuento de cincuenta por ciento (50%) en los derechos anuales en la compra del marbete para su vehículo de motor." Fifty percent off the annual registration sticker fee. It may be taken for one vehicle only, registered in the veteran's name, annually. No rating, no age, no era test. If you are a veteran in Puerto Rico and you pay full price for a marbete, you are leaving money on the table every year. Excise exemption on a VA-provided adapted vehicle. Automobiles provided to disabled veterans for personal use by or with the help of VA are exempt from the vehicle excise tax under what is now Section 3020.08 of the 2011 Internal Revenue Code. Replacements are also exempt, provided the vehicle being replaced was held by the veteran for personal use for at least four years. Where the vehicle being replaced lost its usefulness through fortuitous causes not attributable to the owner's negligence, the four-year holding period does not apply. If the owner sells or transfers the vehicle before four years, the acquirer must pay the excise, computed on the taxable price on which the exemption was granted less depreciation, before taking possession. Licence fee exemption on the same vehicle. Automobiles provided to disabled veterans by or with VA help are exempt from the licence fees set by Ley 22-2000, the Ley de Vehículos y Tránsito. The Departamento de Transportación y Obras Públicas provides every disabled veteran a removable parking placard with a distinctive mark identifying the car as a disabled veteran's. If the owner disposes of the vehicle, the acquirer owes the fees from that year onward. Parking. Article 6.19(a)(22) of the Ley de Vehículos y Tránsito, on parking, does not apply to disabled veterans issued a licence and a removable placard under Article 2.23 of that Act. Driver licence fees at one hundred percent. Disabled veterans exempt from vehicle excise, and those declared one hundred percent incapacitated by VA, pay no licence fees on a vehicle they own and no amount at all under paragraphs (20) and (21) of Article 23.02 of the Ley de Vehículos y Tránsito, which are the fees for obtaining a driver's licence. If such an owner sells the vehicle, the year's licence fees are imposed. The over-sixty exoneration. Veterans over sixty years of age, "aun cuando no estén clasificados con una incapacidad relacionada al servicio," are exonerated from fees for vehicle licence transfers, ex parte transfers, including the DTOP inspections done for those purposes, licence and title applications, and driver's licence renewals. That is an age route with no disability requirement at all, and it is the second benefit here most often missed. One more exemption sits nearby. Article 4C, Fourth, declares exempt from every class of tax and excise the property a veteran acquires from war surplus material, provided it is for personal use and has a total value of no more than five thousand dollars, with the Secretary of Hacienda to promulgate the implementing regulation. The veteran licence plate matters beyond appearances here: under Article 5 of the Act, a driver's licence carrying the veteran designation is itself accepted evidence of veteran status, and Article 4G's reserved parking provision accepts a veteran plate or a veteran-designated licence as proof.