You may get money back if you were 'wrongly' charged fee on your Ohio driver's license

If you paid a $1.50 lamination fee for your driver's license between July 2018 and July 2019, you're probably part of a lawsuit against the Ohio Bureau of Motor Vehicles that could force the state to return more than $3 million.

The class action lawsuit, which seeks to have the $1.50 fee plus interest refunded to every member of the lawsuit, comes after reporting by the Columbus Dispatch that lamination fees were charged by registrars even though they were not performing the service after the switch to federally compliant driver's licenses and ID cards.

Based on the monthly average of the nearly 2.6 million driver's licenses and 448,000 ID cards issued in 2018, an estimated 2 million Ohioans since have paid more than $3 million in lamination fees.

That $1.50 fee in a state budget was later kept but renamed to the now-called "document authentication fee" to pay for additional duties registrars now perform to handle federally compliant licenses, such as further document verification and scanning.

"The verbiage was never updated to reflect changes in technology," a BMV spokesperson had said then.

If you want to opt out of the lawsuit, you have until Nov. 6, 2023, the BMV announced Wednesday.

To opt out, one must submit a form that can be found at www.OhioLaminationFeesLitigation.com. If you don't opt out, you won't be able to partake in any other litigation involving the fees and will be bound by the case's ruling.

Former Dispatch reporter Randy Ludlow contributed.

Titus Wu is a reporter for the USA TODAY Network Ohio Bureau, which serves the Columbus Dispatch, Cincinnati Enquirer, Akron Beacon Journal and 18 other affiliated news organizations across Ohio.