By Haul Handbook editorial team· Updated Sep 28, 2026
Connecticut prices its IRP trip permit on the DMV fee page: a 72-hour permit for a qualifying truck that is not apportioned for Connecticut, sold through commercial wire services. The fuel side has no published Connecticut price. DRS says fuel trip permits run at most ten days, and the per-mile Highway Use Fee has no temporary permit at all, so a heavy truck on a trip permit still owes it.
The trip permit (registration side)
This credential answers for registration. Without it, a vehicle whose cab card does not list Connecticut has no legal registration standing in the state.
- Fee
- $15 ($15, plus $2 when the permit comes through a wire service, on the DMV fees for apportioned registration table. The wire service also charges its own service fee, and the DMV notes the total usually comes to $40 to $50.)
- Who needs it
- A qualified vehicle from another IRP jurisdiction, meaning a gross or combined gross weight over 26,000 pounds or three or more axles, that has no cab card listing Connecticut, before it enters the state. The same rule runs the other way: a Connecticut truck without apportioned plates needs a trip permit from every other jurisdiction it enters.
- Where to buy
- Commercial wire services that sell trip permits by phone for credit card payment; the DMV IRP Section gives out their current phone numbers at 860-263-5281; The Connecticut DMV IRP Unit does not sell trip permits over the counter; its own page and manual send carriers to the wire services
The fuel permit (tax side)
This credential answers for the state's highway or fuel tax when there is no IFTA license (or, in the weight-distance states, no tax account) behind the truck.
- Fee
- No Connecticut fuel trip permit fee is published by DRS. The IFTA Manual (IP 2021(6)) describes trip permits without pricing them, and the DRS IFTA pages list no amount. Reseller sites quote a figure, but none is recorded here without a DRS or statutory source.
- Valid for
- The DRS IFTA Manual says trip permits have a maximum duration of ten days, and that no single IFTA trip permit covers every member jurisdiction. C.G.S. 12-487(c) matches: the Commissioner may authorize a carrier to run without identification markers for no more than ten days when enforcement would cause undue delay and hardship. DRS publishes no shorter standard term for Connecticut.
- Who needs it
- An interstate carrier running a qualified motor vehicle in Connecticut without an IFTA license, meaning a vehicle with two axles over 26,000 pounds, three or more axles at any weight, or a combination over 26,000 pounds. A licensee whose decals are missing can also be made to buy a trip permit.
- Where to buy
- No sales channel is published: the DRS IFTA pages and manual name no vendor or counter for a Connecticut fuel trip permit, and the only mechanism in statute is the Commissioner of Revenue Services' authorization by letter or telegram under C.G.S. 12-487(c)
- Caught without one
- Running a qualified motor vehicle in Connecticut without properly affixed identification markers is an infraction with a $90 fine under C.G.S. 12-487(c). Connecticut IFTA licensees adding a truck do not need a trip permit: they carry a 30-day temporary permit from DRS while the permanent decals are placed.
Other temporary permits in Connecticut
Short-term credentials Connecticut issues beside the trip and fuel permits, for situations those two do not cover.
- 45-day temporary authority (IRP)
- Issued to carriers with IRP accounts in good standing to add a vehicle to the account or to change the registered weight of a vehicle already in it. The fee is $15, plus $2 if received from a wire service. Miles run under it count in the IRP renewal mileage.
- Hunter's permit
- A $20 permit to travel empty to look for a job or return home. The DMV IRP manual describes it as a 20-day temporary permit for an owner-operator who has ended a lease and surrendered the apportioned plate and cab card to the carrier.
- Highway Use Fee (no temporary permit)
- DRS answers no when asked whether a temporary Highway Use Fee permit will be issued for occasional operation of heavy, multi-unit trucks on Connecticut highways. A carrier running an eligible vehicle, 26,000 pounds or more in FHWA Classes 8 to 13, must hold the standing Highway Use Fee permit, which does not expire, and file quarterly in myconneCT, even when the truck entered on a trip permit. (C.G.S. 12-493a)
Worth knowing
The two sides are separate in Connecticut. A 72-hour IRP trip permit covers registration only, and the fuel use tax needs either an IFTA license or a fuel trip permit. On top of both sits the Highway Use Fee, which no temporary credential replaces. A Connecticut carrier with IRP plates that runs into a state not on its cab card still needs that state's trip permit, at that state's price.
Where these fit in the Connecticut permit stack
Temporary permits are the exception path. The standing credentials they replace are IRP apportioned registration and the Connecticut IFTA license. Oversize loads use a different permit family entirely, covered in Connecticut oversize and overweight permits, and the full picture of every state permit lives in Connecticut trucking permits.