The other direction. A Maine plate that was cancelled - because the vehicle sold, because it was laid up for a winter, because the registration lapsed while nobody was driving it - is brought back into service on this sheet, and like its twin it becomes an order in its own right once Bureau staff have signed and dated it. It matters to a seller who has already handed a car over and then found they need the same plate number back on something else.
Written against MVR-60A (Rev 5/2017), issued under 29-A M.R.S. section 463.
Neither this form nor its twin has anything to say about excise tax. Maine registration begins with the excise tax paid at a town office, and a reactivated plate on a newly acquired vehicle still means a trip to the municipal counter before anything can legally move.
Two documents, and they are not the same thing. Take the blank MVR-60A from the maine.gov copy so you get the revision that is current today, then print our MVR-60A guide and keep it beside you while you fill theirs in.
This is the actual MVR-60A, rendered from the PDF the Maine Bureau of Motor Vehicles publishes and completed end to end: letterhead, every field, and the blocks at the foot.
Amber — you write it
Grey — not yours to fill
Numbered — explained below
Compare the vehicle identification number with the one on the cancellation sheet: same plate number, different car. That is the whole purpose of the pair, and it is why the plate number rather than the vehicle is the thing being switched off and on.
Field by field
Every line, in the order you meet it
1
You fill this in
Class code and registration number
Both from the plate's own registration history.
Watch out: If you no longer have the paperwork, a BMV branch can look the number up. Guessing the class code is how this form comes back.
2
You fill this in
The new vehicle's identification number
The vehicle the reactivated plate will be registered against.
Watch out: This is the box that differs from the cancellation sheet. Everything else about the two forms is the same and this is the field that carries the change.
3
You fill this in
Print and sign
First registrant, plus second registrant if the registration names one.
Watch out: The pairing of printed name and signature on each row is asked for on both sheets and is skipped on both sheets.
4
You fill this in
Date it
The request date box.
Watch out: Activation is not retrospective. The date you ask from is the date cover begins, not the date the vehicle arrived on the drive.
5
You fill this in
Attach the registration if you have it
A copy, where one is available.
Watch out: Same wording as the cancellation sheet, same effect: not mandatory, and it shortens everything.
6
Somebody else fills this in
Notarise before filing
A notary or attorney completes the block naming a county and a state.
Watch out: Two sworn forms for one plate number is a lot of ceremony. Doing both in the same visit is cheaper than doing them a month apart.
7
You fill this in
Then go to the town office
Registration itself still begins with the municipal excise tax.
Watch out: An activated plate is not a registered vehicle. The Bureau's record and your town's excise record are two different things and both have to be right.
At a glance
What goes where
On the form
What to put in it
Class code
The registration class the plate belongs to.
Registration number
The plate number being reactivated.
Vehicle identification number
The vehicle the activated registration will describe.
Every registrant signs
The same instruction as on the cancellation sheet: all persons listed on the registration must sign, with two printed-name and signature pairs provided.
Request date
Beside the signatures.
Notarization
The same full block, under the same capitalised requirement.
BMV use only
Date activated, branch supervisor signature, and main office processed.
What gets this one rejected
•Filed unnotarised, which this sheet rules out in capitals exactly as its twin does.
•One signature where the registration names two registrants.
•A vehicle identification number that belongs to a vehicle the registrant does not own.
•Used in place of an ordinary registration at a town office, which is where a new registration on a new vehicle actually begins.
•Sent with the Bureau's own strip at the foot filled in.
Rules that decide whether it is accepted
•Reactivation is not registration. This restores a plate to service on the Bureau's record. Registering a vehicle in Maine still starts with the municipal excise tax at a town office.
•It is the same instrument in reverse. Both sheets cite the same section of Maine law and both become orders once Bureau staff sign them. Only the word in the heading changes.
•A cancelled plate is not necessarily a lost one. Cancelling puts a plate out of service without giving up the number, which is what makes reactivation possible at all.
Every line here was read off MVR-60A (Rev 5/2017) itself — the PDF is here — and off the Maine Bureau of Motor Vehicles pages.
This is plain-language help with a form, not legal advice, and where our wording and the agency's differ,
theirs governs.
