Keeping Your License: Civil Infractions and the 20-Day Rule, Speeding Fines and Surcharges, Work Zone Doubling, Criminal Violations, Out-of-State Violations, At-Fault Crashes and the Standards of Fault, Surchargeable Events and the Driver Retraining Course, Driving Records, Every Mandatory Suspension Including Junior Operator Charts, Non-Driving Suspensions, Criminal Offense Suspensions, Reinstatement and Hearings, OUI Penalties for First Through Fifth Offenses, Failed and Refused Chemical Tests, How Alcohol and Drugs Affect Driving, Implied Consent and Zero Tolerance, Ignition Interlocks, Under-21 Alcohol Laws, Open Containers, False IDs and Reasons for Nonrenewal
Written for aiforu2 as the source for a practice-test bank and the on-device tutor for the Massachusetts learner's permit exam. The facts follow the official manual; the wording is ours.
Source: Massachusetts RMV Driver's Manual (revised April 2026), Chapter 3 "Keeping Your License" (pages 55–76).
Civil infractions and speeding
Driving is a privilege, and your record tracks civil infractions, criminal violations and crashes where you are more than 50 percent at fault. A civil motor vehicle infraction (speeding, disobeying a signal) is settled by paying the fine or requesting a hearing within 20 days; every fine carries a $5 public safety surcharge, a hearing costs a $25 filing fee refunded if you are found not responsible, and ignoring the citation means a finding of responsibility, a large late fee and suspension if unpaid. Paying admits responsibility, and moving violations raise insurance and count toward suspension; parking tickets are handled by the city or town but block license and registration renewal. The minimum speeding fine is $100 plus the $5 surcharge, plus $10 for each mph over the first ten; all speeding fines include a $50 surcharge for the Head Injury Treatment Services Trust Fund. Driving 73 mph in a 55 zone costs $185. Speeding in a posted work zone doubles the fine. Three speeding convictions in 12 months suspend the license 30 days; a junior operator's first speeding conviction brings 90 days and later ones one year.
Criminal violations, out-of-state offenses and crashes
Criminal violations such as driving suspended, operating under the influence and leaving a crash scene can mean immediate arrest, towing, loss of the license and jail pending court. Refusing to give your name and address, the owner's, your license or registration, or to sign your name for an officer can lead to arrest. Out-of-state violations count as if committed here: unpaid or ignored ones suspend your Massachusetts privilege until resolved, with a reinstatement fee of at least $100, and Massachusetts applies its own suspension rules to "like" offenses even when the other state imposed none. You are more than 50 percent at fault in a crash when your insurer applies one of 19 Standards of Fault (rear-end, wrong side, backing, left turn or U-turn across traffic, leaving a driveway, an opened door, a single-vehicle crash, merging into a highway or rotary, failing to yield to an emergency vehicle, entering from a side road at a T, and others) and pays more than $1,000. Violations and at-fault crashes are surchargeable events: three in two years require the eight-hour Driver Retraining Course within 90 days or an indefinite suspension; seven in three years bring an automatic 60-day suspension. The Safe Driver Insurance Plan raises premiums for them. An attested driving record costs $20, an unattested one $8 online.
Suspensions
The RMV can suspend immediately for an immediate threat or improper operation, and for six months without conviction (one year after one) for transferring, altering or faking a license or ID, using another person's or lying to get one. Mandatory adult suspensions: three speeding violations in a year, 30 days; three surchargeable events in two years, retraining within 90 days or indefinite suspension; seven in three years, 60 days; a habitual traffic offender (three major or twelve major and minor violations in five years), four years with a $500 fee; an out-of-state suspension, until resolved; most reinstatement fees are $100. Junior operators on a permit lose it 60 days, then 180 days, then a year for driving without a licensed driver or during the night restriction (retaking the exam, with attitudinal retraining from the second offense); 90 days then a year for speeding; one year then three for drag racing (with retraining and possibly the State Courts Against Road Rage course); 60, 180 days and a year for using a mobile device with fines of $100, $250 and $500; and 180 days then a year for negligent operation with injury from a phone, with fees of $100 to $1,000. On a JOL the same periods apply to passenger and night violations, speeding, drag racing, device use, and negligent or reckless operation (180 days, then a year within three years), with new exams and road tests required at the higher offenses and $500 fees. Any junior operator convicted of OUI, operating to endanger, leaving a scene, an open container, unauthorized use, lending a license or motor vehicle homicide gets an extra 180 days (one year thereafter), and parents are notified. Non-driving suspensions follow unpaid child support, failing to register as a sex offender, drug trafficking, unpaid state income tax and a bad payment to the RMV (cleared with the fee, a reinstatement fee and $15). Criminal offense suspensions: driving suspended 60 days to one year ($500 fee); using a vehicle without authority or larceny, one to three years; leaving a crash with injury, one to two years; with property damage, 60 days to a year; operating to endanger, 60 days to a year; motor vehicle homicide or vehicular manslaughter, 15 years to lifetime; OUI, one year, two, eight, ten and lifetime for the first through fifth offenses with fees of $500, $700, $1,200 and $1,200; drug trafficking, one to five years; graffiti, one year; adult drag racing, 30 to 180 days; phone-related negligent injury, 60 days to a year. When suspended, stop driving immediately; driving suspended is criminal. Reinstatement may need a telephone hearing, where the officer only checks that the law was applied and can take ten business days; fees run $100 up to $1,200, and suspensions of two years or more require passing the permit exam and road test again.
OUI penalties
Operating under the influence of alcohol or drugs: a first offense brings a $500 to $5,000 fine, up to 2½ years in prison and a one-year suspension, which an alcohol education program can cut to 45 to 90 days over 21 or 210 days under 21; a second, $600 to $10,000, 30 days to 2½ years and two years; a third (felony), $1,000 to $15,000, 150 days to five years and eight years; a fourth, $1,500 to $25,000, one to five years and ten years; a fifth, $2,000 to $50,000, two to five years and a lifetime suspension. A failed chemical test (BAC 0.08 or more) suspends drivers over 21 for 30 days or until the case ends; drivers 18 to 21 for 30 days plus 180 days, and under 18 for 30 days plus one year, the extra time waivable or reduced to 180 days by entering an alcohol education program on a first offense, regardless of the court outcome. Refusing a test suspends drivers over 21 for 180 days with no prior OUI, three years with one, five years with two and lifetime with three or more; ages 18 to 21 add 180 days and under 18 add one year. Refusals do not count as prior OUI offenses.
Alcohol, drugs and driving
Alcohol is a depressant that slows reflexes, lengthens reaction time, distorts vision and judgment, breeds false confidence, and makes you less likely to buckle up, more likely to speed and less able to hold a lane; it causes about 30 percent of highway deaths, raises crash risk five times, and combined with marijuana twelve times. Even one drink in an hour affects driving, worse when tired, upset or hungry. Blood alcohol content depends on weight, amount, food, time and metabolism, not the kind of drink: a 12-ounce beer, a 5-ounce glass of wine and 1.5 ounces of 80-proof liquor each hold about half an ounce of alcohol and can raise an average person's BAC by 0.02. Only time removes it; coffee, cold showers, exercise and food do not. Under the implied consent law every driver agrees to field sobriety tests and, after arrest, a breath or blood test. The legal limit is 0.08; under 21 the zero-tolerance law penalizes 0.02 or higher. Over the limit or refusing, the officer takes your license on the spot. Drivers under 21 are twice as likely to be in alcohol crashes. With two or more OUI offenses, a hardship license or reinstatement requires an ignition interlock at your expense for the whole hardship period and two more years after reinstatement. Under 21 it is illegal to buy alcohol or have it bought for you, or to carry or transport it without a parent, with suspensions of 90 days to one year and 180 days for buying or trying to. The open container law forbids drinking while driving or any open alcoholic drink inside the vehicle even in a passenger's hand, fined $100 to $500, with arrest and suspension under 21. Using, altering or borrowing a false license or ID is usually a felony: suspension up to six months without conviction and one year with one, and Internet fake IDs invite identity theft. OUI laws apply to drugs; marijuana, though decriminalized in some respects, still makes driving a crime, slows responses to sights and sounds, hurts multitasking and ruins night vision. Hard drugs, sedatives, cold and allergy medicines, codeine, stimulants and inhalants all impair, prescriptions included, and mixing alcohol with drugs multiplies the effect. The RMV will not renew a license with unpaid parking fines, abandoned vehicle citations, unpaid local excise tax, outstanding warrants, or unpaid E-ZPass or Tobin Bridge violations, without official release forms or a court recall notice.
Practise this with Massachusetts Driver License questions
More of this guide
Who needs a Massachusetts license and the no-grace-period rule, visitors and military, the 16 and 16½ ages, parent consent, the photo policy, the 20/40 and 120-degree vision standards, REAL ID versus Standard cards, license classes and 5-year terms, restriction codes, the Junior Operator License with its 30-12-6 driver education hours, 40 supervised hours, passenger rule and 12:30 to 5 a.m. curfew, JOL suspensions, identification documents, the $30 permit exam with 25 questions and 18 to pass, permit rules, the $35 road test, sponsors, vehicle requirements, six attempts a year, what is tested, conversions, voting, the veteran indicator, organ donation and every fee.
Required lights and equipment, 35 percent tint, annual inspections, safety kits, the $25 seat belt fines and exemptions, child restraints to age 8 or 57 inches, how belts work, air bags, headphones and televisions, children in truck beds, the hands-free law with its $100, $250 and $500 penalties and the ban for drivers under 18, defensive driving, health, the 2/32-inch tread and 60-foot plate rules, the three-second rule and 4 and 10-second exceptions, the 215-foot stop at 50 mph, horn and headlight rules including wipers-on-lights-on, night driving at 350 and 100 feet, drowsy driving, rain, hydroplaning, winter driving and clearing snow, the four-foot vulnerable road user law, pedestrians, bicycles, motorcycles, mopeds, scooters and low-speed vehicles.
Pedestrian survival at 20, 30 and 40 mph, the fundamental speed law, the 20, 30, 40 and 50 mph unposted limits, thickly settled districts, the Turnpike and tunnel minimums, school zones, every signal color and arrow including right and left turns on red, rapid flashing beacons, pedestrian hybrid beacons, bicycle signals, dark signals as four-way stops, pedestrian laws, sign colors including pink and purple, stop, yield and all-way signs, warning and guide signs, railroad crossings and the 15-foot stop, flaggers, arrow boards and detours, white and yellow line rules, sharrows, five-foot bike lanes, advisory lanes, green and red pavement, stop and yield lines, channelizing islands and crossing guards, with pictures of the signs.
Hand signals and look-signal-move, lane rules, breakdown lanes, highway entering and exiting with the 500-foot signal, blind spots and highway hypnosis, blocking intersections, turning from the proper lane, turns on red, U-turns and 500-foot visibility, center turn lanes, the three-point turn, backing, right-of-way rules including the White Cane Law, four-way stops, driveways and throughways, rotaries at up to 40 mph and their lane rules, roundabouts at 25 mph, courtesy crashes, passing with 400 feet of visibility and 200 feet before oncoming traffic, passing on the right, the move-over law, aggressive drivers, school buses and the $250 fine, trucks and their two right lanes, trolleys and the 8-foot rule, funeral processions and purple lights, animals, parking within 12 inches, hill parking, the full no-parking list with 20 and 10-foot distances and $100, $300 and $500 fines, pedestrian rules, bicycle laws, the four-foot passing law, the Dutch Reach, bicycle boxes and separated lanes.
Pulling right and stopping for emergency vehicles, the 300-foot following rule, stationary emergency vehicles and the move-over law, the 800-foot fire rule, what to do and not do when a police officer stops you including the $35 and $100 fines and why you need not sign a citation, skids, running off the pavement, blowouts, brake failure with and without ABS, a stuck gas pedal, head-on threats, headlight failure, stalling on railroad tracks and the 45-degree escape, breakdowns with triangles at 10 and 100 feet, car fires, driving into water, tunnels, crash duties and the Driver Removal Law, the five-day report for $1,000 in damage, first aid, hit-and-run penalties up to 10 years in prison, witnessing a crash, and green driving with the five-minute idling law.