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MoTing rotter

In December last year I had my 6 yr old Ford Mondeo MoT'd at a Ford dealer. The car was serviced and the service department took measurements of the tyres tread depth outer to inner as follows. n/s front 3 3 2mm, o/s front 4 3 3mm, o/s rear 4 5 5mm, n/s rear 4 5 4mm. The car was then sent to the MOT tester who issued a VT32 advisory notice stating the o/s front, nearside front and nearside rear tyres "were worn close to the legal limit" but did not state any measurements. The legal limit is 1.6mm. The MOT test does not have a definition of what Constitutes "Close to the legal limit". This VT32 info is stored on VOSA's website. I went through VOSA's complaint procedure who agreed that the nearside rear was not "close " and should not have been on VT32 but state that the MOT tester is only giving his opinion and nobody can change that. VOSA cannot even remove it from their website. I cannot even make a complaint against the Tester. I have referred the matter to the Ombudsman and to the Dept of Transport via my MP but the answer is still the same. The MOT Tester can state that a tyre of 4mm depth is "close to the legal limit" on a VT32 without giving any measurements. VOSA will then publish that information on their website and have no power to remove or edit that info. Therefore I can only conclude that an MOT Tester can state that a brand new tyre is "close to the legal limit" and no one will be able to do anything about it. Can you advise me if there is anyone who can do something about this

Asked on 25 July 2009 by

Answered by Honest John
No. The complaints procedure only works if an MoT tester passes something that obviously should not have passed. There is no appeals procedure, except to take it to another MoT testing
station and have the whole test done again. More at www.vosa.gov.uk
Tags: mot owning
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