Stale figures

California moved to 30/60/15. Half the SR-22 internet did not.

If you go looking for what a California SR-22 certifies, you will find two answers with roughly equal confidence behind them. One is 15/30/5. The other is 30/60/15. Only one of them is a rule that currently applies to anything, and the interesting part is not which — it is why the wrong one survives so well.

What the current figure is

Proof of financial responsibility in California means at least $30,000 for injury to or death of one person, at least $60,000 where two or more people are injured or killed in one accident, and at least $15,000 for property damage. That is the definition section, and it is the section an SR-22 attests to.

The California DMV publishes the same three amounts on its own insurance requirements page, citing the Insurance Code rather than the Vehicle Code. Two different statutes, two different agencies, the same three numbers. There is no ambiguity in the primary sources at all.

Where the old figure is still living

Here is the thing worth knowing. The old figure is not only on stale copies. It is in the current text of the Vehicle Code itself.

Section 16056 sets the limits a policy needs to count as security after an accident. Its paragraph (a)(1), on the Legislature’s own site, still reads “not less than fifteen thousand dollars ($15,000)” for one person, “thirty thousand dollars ($30,000)” for two or more, and “five thousand dollars ($5,000)” for property. The new amounts are in the next paragraph, (a)(2), which begins “Notwithstanding paragraph (1), for any policy or bond issued or renewed on or after January 1, 2025”. The section closes with “This section shall become operative on January 1, 2025.”

So the first numbers a reader meets in section 16056 are the old ones. Anyone who reads only the opening paragraph — a person skimming, a scraper, a summary written in a hurry — comes away with 15/30/5. It is not a typo. The date is doing all the work, and it is one paragraph further down. That is why this site checked the California figure twice before publishing it: once in section 16430, which has only the current amounts, and once against the DMV’s own page.

The same trap, in a different state, in one section

Virginia uses the same mechanism, with the two versions in two lettered subsections of one section of the live code.

Subsection (A) of Va. Code section 46.2-472 sets out the amounts for policies effective on or after 1 January 2022 but before 1 January 2025. Subsection (B) sets out the amounts for policies effective on or after 1 January 2025. They are $30,000/$60,000/$20,000 and $50,000/$100,000/$25,000 respectively. Both are correct. Both are current text. Only one applies to a policy you would buy today.

Read that section quickly, or scrape it, or ask a model about it, and there is a real chance of coming back with the first set. They are not marked as expired, because they are not expired — they still govern policies written in that window.

Two more states that keep the old figures in the live text

Virginia is not unusual. Since this note was first written, two more states read for this site turned out to keep superseded amounts in the same section as the current ones, clearly and legitimately, for the same reason.

Utah sets its minimums in the Insurance Code. Subsection (1) of Utah Code section 31A-22-304 gives $25,000 / $65,000 / $15,000, for policies issued or renewed on or before 31 December 2024. Subsection (2) gives $30,000 / $65,000 / $25,000, for policies issued or renewed on or after 1 January 2025. The single-limit alternative moved too, from $80,000 to $90,000. Both subsections sit in the current section, one above the other. A reader who stops at subsection (1) comes away with the old floor, and a policy written at it today does not meet the section.

Tennessee goes further. Its definition of proof of financial responsibility is written as a series of dated windows, each keyed to when proof was required. Proof required from 1 January 2017 to 31 December 2022 means $25,000 / $50,000 / $15,000; proof required after 31 December 2022 means $25,000 / $50,000 / $25,000, or a single limit of $65,000. Earlier windows are listed separately again. The same subdivision says a policy that complied at the end of a window is not in violation until its first renewal after the change — so for a while, both figures are simultaneously correct for different drivers.

That is the pattern in all three states. The old number is not an error in the statute. It is correct text for a closed window, printed next to the open one, with the date doing all the work. Strip the date and it becomes a wrong answer that looks exactly like a right one.

One more detail from the states read since. Most financial responsibility chapters never use the words “SR-22” — they describe a certificate from an insurer and leave the form number to the agency. Colorado’s does not. Its definition section says “the form known as the ‘SR-22’ furnished to the department may be used as proof of financial responsibility,” directly after setting its own amounts of 25/50/15. Where the statute names the form, there is less room for a summary to drift from it.

Why this matters on a quote

A carrier quoting you at 15/30/5 in California is not offering a discount. It is offering a policy that will not satisfy the filing, which means the certificate either will not be issued or will be issued against cover that does not meet the statute. Either way you find out later, and later is after the DMV has been told something.

The practical defense is dull: ask for the three numbers, in writing, and check them against the section. It takes a minute and it is the only part of this process where you can catch an error before it becomes a suspension.

The next one is already scheduled

Section 16430 does something unusual. It contains its own future. From 1 January 2035, the minimum bodily-injury cover rises by a further twenty thousand dollars — written into the statute rather than left to a later bill.

So today’s California figure has a known shelf life. Any page describing it without a date attached will be wrong twice over: once already, for anyone who copied the pre-2025 amounts, and once again in 2035 for everyone else.

That is the entire argument for putting an effective date next to every number. It costs nothing, it is checkable, and it is the difference between a figure and a rumour.

All notes · What an SR-22 is · SR-22 by state