Safe Speed Forums

I'm looking at a replacement for my Golf which was stolen over XMas, and have found one that may be suitable.

The only problem is, it's in Wembly, I'm in Aylesbury and the tax expired yesterday.

Can I legally drive it home, assuming I'm insured and have an MOT etc. Bearing in mind we'll have to use the M1 and thus risk tripping ANPR cameras.

Well as far as I understand it there are two offences, not having tax and not displaying a tax disc. The advice given out by a clerk at DVLA's 'Bournemouth' office to someone else who was contemplating the latter offence was "you might as well risk it as it's only for one day".

Maybe I should have said something or got their name and reported them to the police for "incitement to commit an offence".

If you have access to another set of "ANPR safe" numberplates you could attach them to the vehicle for the journey. More illegal but less chance of getting caught. How crazy this country is. (of course I'm not suggesting you actually do that, it's just to show how stupid the law here is.)

I think to be legal you would have to buy tax or get the vehicle towed home somehow.

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Andrew.

Sod's law says if you try your luck, you'll end up with somebody running into you, you won't be able to produce your documents, the PC with a hangover will throw the book at you, you end up a loads o trouble. If you're insured and have an MOT then just pop into a post office tomorrow and get it taxed, then you know you're legal. There's really no need or justification for driving it illegally, even if you think the chances of being picked up are minimal, given that it's so easy to do it legally.

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Peter Humphries (and a green V8S)

Don't you have 14 days grace with tax anyway? I'd have thought that if you have insurance and the car has an MOT you'd be allowed to drive it home, surely. But the cops do here the old story of how "I just bought it officer" every day. But you'd have the receipt to prove it though wouldn't you?

No, you do not have 14 days grace, or any even.
In "the old days" you could tax a vehicle back to the start of the month up to 14 days....so you effectively got away with it.
Now, you definitely don't have any time at all. If you vehicle isn't taxed continuously, you get fined....like, if you're a day late it'll cost you 80 quid.

Short answer is no! Get the person that owns the car to tax it and give them the cash for the tax. If the vehicle is no longer insured by them then get it insured yourself, pick up a tax disc from a post office local to them using the V5 slip thingummy, your insurance cert and the current MOT and then drive it home. This way you have the insurance certificate on you too if you are stopped. It isn't worth the risk of not taxing it.

I'd expect a copper that stopped you to impound the car then ask questions later. Every uninsured and untaxed wretch always says they've just bought it and probably has a fake receipt they hand out in the hope they'll be let off so having a receipt on its own would be no guarantee.

The other alternative is to have it trailered home but you'd need somewhere off road to park it as it wouldn't have a current tax disk. It is also now an offence to not either renew the tax straight away or get the vehicle sorned. If you didn't tax it before the end of January for some reason then you'd be in trouble as the new registered keeper.

That's a bit harsh.

Can you tax your car over the phone over christmas? That way even though you're not actually showing a valid tax disc it will, or at least should, show on the database that the vehicle is taxed. But then it's likely that the person trying his/her best to be legal will get pulled over when the tosser that can't even spell "tax disc" drives on.

No.

A member of another forum thought he could get away with it and wound up with 3 fines. Something like driving untaxed, not displaying a tax disk and failing to renew. IIRC.

If the tax expired yesterday I don't think the ANPR database will be up to date enough to register a violation.

In any case If you have the original reminder you may be able to do it on line. Ask the owner for the numbers from the reminder form.

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Speed camera policy Kills

Well, it turned out to be an irrelevent question anyway.

The owner was happy to tax it for us tomorrow using his docs which most car dealerships aren't, they will want my insurance certificate, wheras I'm looking to go with my GF to look at a car, phone the insurance and then drive it home.

But that's not why it was an irrelevent question, it's irrelevent because if you removed the oil filler cap from this "good runner" while the engine was running it would make a farting noise and belch smoke that stinks of petrol, also it would pop out of first all the time. Bodywork was excellent, but TBH I'd rather have a rustbucket with a reliable drivetrain and a long MOT right now.

At least it was better than yesterdays one, no tax or MOT, then he rings back an hour later, "I've just got this car in part ex, it's great and it's got 3 months tax and test left, you'll love it", 60 miles to Leicester later only for my GF to rip off a chunk of the sill and hand it to the seller. "this fell off your car". First time I've felt sorry for a car salesman, he looked gutted.

If anyone's got a cheapo runabout (£150 max) they want rid of within 60ish miles of Aylesbury, PM me!

Try ebay, loads on there.

As for the tax....if you're a DAY late the bill will fall through your letter box.....A guy at work got back from a stateside holiday on the 1st of the month, and taxed his car on the 2nd....and got the bill a week later...
So, you've got 15 days to tax your car....and since everyone knows it, they've got no excuse.
You can even tax it online from abroad, if you've got the details !

I thought that if you taxed a car on, say, the 20th of the month, it would run from the 1st of said month, thereby losing £X?

That's the reason I wait 'til the start of a month to buy a car!

If you buy a car from a dealer he will be able to tax it starting from the actual date you bought it (or at least rounded to the nearest week).

If you buy privately it will (unless off the road) already be taxed, so the tax will be transferred to you.

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"Show me someone who says that they have never exceeded a speed limit, and I'll show you a liar, or a menace." (Austin Williams - Director, Transport Research Group)

Any views expressed in this post are personal opinions and may not represent the views of Safe Speed

This explains it better....
http://www.v8register.net/subpages/sorn1.htm

Oh, and wandering through the dvla, I came across the information that they intend to recall all paper licences....sometime in 2007/2008.

That's news to me. It would also be news to the few car dealers I have had dealings with.

The dvla seem convinced that vehicle tax starts on the 1st of the month, and ends on the last day of a month

Well, that has certainly happened the last 3 times I bought a car (1 used, 2 new), including last week. Paid £153.50 for 12 months and one week's VED.

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"Show me someone who says that they have never exceeded a speed limit, and I'll show you a liar, or a menace." (Austin Williams - Director, Transport Research Group)

Any views expressed in this post are personal opinions and may not represent the views of Safe Speed

As far as I understand, VED runs for 1 month from the first day of that month until and including the last day.
What with the new databases I'm sure it would be easy for them to allow per-day VED (eg. if you only want it for 20 days that's all you pay for) but that would make people's lives easier and would make them less money. I guess it's not going to happen.

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Andrew.

Well, I've just bought the nastiest car I've ever owned, but it has tax until May and MOT till the end of Februrary.

It's a C reg Toyota corolla 1.3 GL automatic, and it's really slow, I guess it encourages smooth driving as you have to plan your junctions way i advance for best line and fitting into gaps.

Is there anyone near Aylesbury with a welder that fancies earning a few beer tokens? When you open the door, the corner bit towards the rear of the car needs plating on both sides before the MOT runs out. Underneath seems fine though

my uncle recently blagged his way out of a fine, he'd moved house, not yet changed the DLVA regs and the vehicle was parked offroad pending repair work, they still wanted to see receipts for the hire vehicle he was using though.

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Fear is a weapon of mass distraction