2 words....Cash grab.
Lets not forget the year we were all slapped with paying for our license every year instead of every two, and at the same price, 100% increase. Anyone know about that before it happened? I found out when they sent me a bill to pay for my license a year after I had paid my "2 yrs" renewal, no warning. Fantastic government we have here. Worst part, their cash grab tricks are just gonna keep getting worse.
In my opinion, what the SAAQ are doing with this charging for not advising about storage is a total scam and should be illegal for the only reason that no matter how you look at it.... a plate is not valid to drive with after it expires, you will be ticketed for sure for expired plates.. why should anyone pay for something they never had?? Seriously, how hard could it be for them to program their system to automatically put a vehicle into storage status until the plates are payed??? Makes sense, no? I'm no programmer but even I could manage that. Although, the truth is, a simple phone call does avoid this.
Bro, no doubt they do it on purpose, probably planned... It's just another one of those just suck it up and eat it moments, courtesy of our government and, let's not forget our "friends" the insurance companies.