The Registration Story

My son (a German) brought up this story last night.

For those who aren't aware of the German law....there is this rule that when you move (from city to city)....within a month after making the move, you need to register yourself at the new city-hall.  You give them your address, and your new phone number.

So, he's got some young guy (roughly 23 years old), who works in the building with him.  Note in this story that there are a lot of young people in the building (probably 50-percent are between 18 and 28 years old).

This guy made a move from a town to Mainz about nine months ago.  Fairly significant move.....over 70 miles.  The thing is....he never went to register himself.

At some point (actually multiple points), probably even going back to the past 11 months....he was blitz-camera-caught.  That means he was speeding and some camera caught the action. The cops got the film....noted his speed and mailed him a ticket in the mail....to the OLD address.  He never saw it....never responded.

Well....last month, this guy accidentally bumped some person in a grocery parking lot, doing a small bit of damage.  He didn't feel the bump....didn't stop, and just drove on out.  We can argue over this part of the story. It might not be totally innocent.  But someone saw his tag and the cops got called. 

So the cops ended up doing research and figured out who he was and where he lived.  They came....taking his license for thirty days (serious things like leaving a car accident is such).

After the 30 days....he came down to pick up the license.  Well....no, says the cops.  They've done more research and pulled out several speeding tickets from this 'mystery' period.  So they've said now that they are holding his license for nine months.  I was kinda blown away.....nine months is a hefty period that you can't drive.

I asked.....how could this kid be that stupid not to register?  Well....my son points out all these things in life that school doesn't cover.  He threw out twenty-odd things which just never get mentioned. Here you had some captive audience for years and years....and these sort of little laws never got mentioned.  In my son's case, there's a vast amount of information that just never got mentioned and he was simply lucky that my wife harped on these or mentioned these on a continual basis.

So I looked at this and asked about this guy and his car.  Nine months with the car sitting in some parking lot?  Well....no.  The guy had already found someone who desperately needed a vehicle for a couple of months, and was willing to pay 200 Euro a month 'rental' fee.  It sounds like crazy, but yeah....he's covering his insurance and general cost....by renting this out.

Then my son brings up this odd factor in the building.  Out of forty-odd people in the business....at least five of them don't have a license (never took the course or passed the exam).  These are people who either ride a bike over or take the city-bus.  Again, it's an odd statistic because twenty years ago, it would have been near zero.

So I bring up this last question with the son. Are there more people like this guy in the business....who don't know about the registration requirement?  He just grinned....he thought at least five other people in the business also are living in new apartments, and never registered themselves.