Hawaii SR-22 Insurance: Who Needs a Filing and for How Long

Hawaii uses the SR-22, but it is filed with a county office, not a state agency. The statute calls it a "certificate of insurance" showing proof of financial responsibility; the counties that collect it — for example the Kauai Division of Motor Vehicles Financial Responsibility Section — call it the SR-22 form and tell drivers only their insurer can file it.

Filed by the insurance carrier with the "administrator", which Haw. Rev. Stat. § 287-1 defines as the chief of police or the director of finance of each county. There is no statewide filing office. A related form, the SR-21, is what an insurer files to show coverage was in force at the time of a reported crash.

Proof must stay on file for three years. The administrator may release it only after three years have passed with no new conviction that would require or permit suspension. Surrendering your license does not shorten the clock: if you reapply inside the three years, the application is refused unless you re-establish proof for the remainder.

Driving without insurance is deliberately left off this list. Haw. Rev. Stat. § 287-20(a) excludes "the first conviction within a five-year period for driving without a valid motor vehicle insurance policy", and § 431:10C-117(a)(3)(A) adds that a driver whose license the court suspends for driving uninsured "shall not be required to obtain proof of financial responsibility pursuant to section 287-20". A plain moving violation is excluded too, along with administrative suspensions under chapter 291A and provisional license suspensions under § 286-102.6(d) — it is only when the moving violation happened in a crash of the size described above that proof is demanded.

A certified policy cannot be cancelled or terminated until at least ten days after the insurer files notice with the administrator — unless a replacement policy is certified first, in which case the new certificate takes over on its effective date. The filing requirement itself does not go away: the license stays unissuable until proof is back on file for the balance of the three years.

There is no statewide reinstatement fee because the counties run driver licensing. Hawaii County's published fee schedule charges $50. The City and County of Honolulu asks $20, payable to "City and County of Honolulu". Check the county you license in.