Getting your vehicle safetied today will likely cost you significantly more than it did in February.

MPI spokesperson Brian Smiley explains that the provincial government has dropped the set $55 safety fee and has left the price up to the inspection stations.

“The fee has been an issue with mechanics for a long time,” says Smiley, who indicates that this change is one result of The Traffic and Transportation Modernization Act that was put in place as of March 1st.

“It’s all part of the government's efforts to reduce red tape,” he explains.

Kevin Penner of Penner Performance in Blumenort agrees that the government’s set rate had been an annoyance and says many garages in the area had stopped performing safety inspections altogether because it caused them to lose money.

“I would suspect that this change would encourage more shops to do safeties again,” he comments.

Penner notes this cost variation is paralleled by an increasingly involved inspection process.

Penner says safety inspections will now take longer due to increasingly meticulous criteria (Photo credit: Kevin Penner).

“In the old system, you put in an ‘X’ for fails and a checkmark for passes, whereas now you need to go to the regulations, document the number, and write down the infraction: it will take considerably more time.”

Penner indicates that the new safety standards also clarify areas that were formerly gray. For example, a vehicle’s ride height must now be measured using a specific formula, the tint of a window must be examined with a special device, and all ABS brakes and airbags must be fully functional.

With these new labor requirements and prices at their own discretion, Penner expects the cost of safeties across the board to increase to between $120 and $150 per inspection.

However, if anyone got their vehicle safetied before March 1st, Penner says they need not worry. “If you had a safety inspection done before Thursday, it goes by the old rules and you still have 30 days to comply to the old rules for that safety to be valid.”

According to Penner, vehicle safeties were initially implemented around 25 years ago at $45 apiece. He feels this new Act helps bring the system up to date. “For our industry, this is a big change,” he remarks.

Read more: Big Changes Coming To Traffic And Vehicle Regulations