Dealer fees are charges added by the dealership to the manufacturer’s retail price of the vehicle. They go by various names, such as preparation fees, documentation fees, transportation fees, etc. Anything that is not part of the vehicle’s base price or an option is probably some kind of dealer fee.
There is one thing you have to come to grips with—license, title, and registration fees are the same for all consumers, based on the ZIP code where they live. These are state fees, not dealer fees, and are merely collected by the dealership and sent to the state.
The document fee is also known as a doc fee or paperwork fee. It covers the cost of processing the paperwork relating to the sale of the vehicle, including the filings at the DMV, license plate, checking a trade-in value, sales contracts, and any other paperwork.