The insurance certificate becomes dematerialized on April 1: what that changes for you

From 1^er April 2024, the insurance sticker will no longer be compulsory on the windshield of your vehicle, as will the traditional green card.

When buying a car, taking out insurance is not only an important step, but also an obligatory one before covering your first kilometers. French law requires all drivers to be insured, under penalty of a fine of a maximum amount of 3,750 euros and confiscation of their driving license.

The government will, however, facilitate the procedures in the event of an inspection, to simplify the lives of the most forgetful drivers who have forgotten to replace their green sticker on the anniversary date of their contract.

The green sticker is living its last hours

From 1^er April 2024, it will no longer be necessary to affix your sticker to the windshield of your vehicle. Likewise, you no longer need to keep your green card on you or in your glove compartment.

During a road check, police or gendarmerie officers will connect to the insured vehicle file (FVA), a database supplied by all French insurers. By entering your license plate, they will immediately have access to your insurance to check whether you are in compliance.

The sticker will no longer be sent by insurers each year, which will represent a saving of “50 million letters” and will contribute to the environmental efforts put in place by these companies to reduce their carbon footprint. This disappearance will also make it possible to fight against insurance fraud, as stickers are easily falsified documents.

A paper “memo” to keep in the event of a change of insurer

Insurers are required to indicate contracts taken out or terminated to the FVA within 72 hours. If you have just signed a new contract with another insurer, the latter will issue you with an “Insured Vehicle Memo” in paper format, which you can present to the police in the event of an inspection.

It is also advisable to keep this memo in the glove box to confirm the validity of your insurance, for example in the event of a possible technical problem on the FVA site. The “Insured Vehicle Memo” is also the only proof of your insurance during the first 15 days after purchasing a new vehicle from a dealership.

For the moment, only registered vehicles are affected by this deletion. Owners of electric scooters must keep their insurance certificate with them when traveling.

Source : The Dauphiné Libéré