The Public Services Agency (ASP) has simplified the registration of imported cars in cases where the owner has no original documents or only a copy of the registration certificate. The new rules apply from late June 2026 and remove the most time-consuming step from the process: the trip to a special vehicle-identification office.
How it used to be
Without documents containing all the car’s technical data, the owner was required to physically bring the vehicle to one of the country’s three specialized identification offices — in Chișinău, Bălți or Cahul. There, because of the large number of requests, the technical identification procedure could take up to three days.
What changes
By applying the “single window” principle, the separate identification step disappears. The owner can now go to any ASP subdivision that provides vehicle-registration services, where technical identification is done on the spot. Document exchange and the necessary checks are carried out internally, through ASP’s electronic systems, without the applicant’s involvement, and the file is sent digitally, the same day, to the Vehicle Registration Directorate to verify the car’s history in its country of origin.
The new rules also cover cases where the vehicle’s original documents, issued abroad, have been lost or damaged. According to ASP, the changes aim to cut bureaucracy, remove extra trips and shorten the time needed to register imported cars.
How large the car fleet is
The change comes on top of a huge registry: on 1 April 2026, the State Vehicle Registry held 1,402,237 registered transport units. Some of them are exactly the cars brought from abroad that, until now, got stuck on the paperwork.