If you’ve owned a few Mercury outboards over the years, you may have noticed some changes along the way to Mercury’s registration process. Years ago, Mercury sent owners a wallet-sized warranty card that included the engine serial number and warranty dates to present to your authorized dealer when you needed to have work done on your engine. Later, Mercury transitioned to small booklets called “Owner Resource Guides.” Each Owner Resource Guide contained information about Mercury and included the engine serial number and warranty dates on the back cover. Because an authorized dealer could enter an engine’s serial number into the dealer’s computer database to verify warranty coverage, no paperwork needed to be shown to the dealer when an engine was brought in.

This brings us to the latest change to Mercury’s registration process. Earlier this year, Mercury discontinued distribution of the Owner Resource Guide. In effect, Mercury no longer sends owners any notification of engine registration or warranty information. Any authorized Mercury dealer nationwide can enter an engine serial number into its database and retrieve registration dates and warranty coverage. Mercury does understand that some people like to have a hard copy of their warranty data. In this case, any authorized Mercury dealer can enter your serial number and print a hard copy showing your registration and warranty data.

You now have a pretty good idea of what occurs when you purchase a Mercury engine at a dealership. So what happens when you purchase an engine from a private party? Well, registering your motor is actually quite easy. Mercury needs you to fax or mail in a copy of a bill of sale showing you’re taking ownership of the engine. The bill of sale can be handwritten or typed and must be signed by each party. It should include the date of purchase, the engine serial number, the prior owner’s information, and the new owner’s information (name, address, phone number). This bill of sale can be mailed to Mercury Marine, Attn: Warranty and Registration, PO Box 1939, Fond du Lac, WI 54936-1939 or faxed to (920) 907-6663. If you fax the bill of sale to us, the registration should be transferred within one business day. After you verify that the registration has changed hands, any authorized Mercury dealer can give you a printout for your records.

How important is it to register your engine? Well, even if you know the engine you’ve purchased no longer carries a factory warranty, we still recommend having it registered under your name. For one, if there are any future service bulletins or fix campaigns released on the engine, they will be mailed directly to the registered owner, whether the engine is under warranty or not. The second reason is that Mercury can only release engine history (warranty claims, service history) to the registered owner.

Please feel free to contact Mercury at 920-929-5040 with any additional engine registration questions.