I seen on the DVLA website a few weeks back (can't find the page now) that you are allowed to drive a car with no MOT on the condition you have made an appointment with a test centre and are driving there to get the MOT done.
I'm wondering if I bought a car with no MOT or tax on it then presumably I could drive it to get the MOT done with no tax on it either. The other thing is does it have to be a test centre near to where you bought the car. For example if I bought a car and drove it 15 miles to a test centre near my home would that be allowed or does the law say the test centre needs to be local to where the car is??
|
|
Something rings a bell also re polling stations. I am sure that there was something in law about being able to drive a car directly to a polling station to vote (general or local election? No idea) then return directly home without an MOT.
|
Yes, you can drive a car without tax or an MoT to a test station provided you have made an appointment. You can also drive it home afterwards if it fails provided it has not been classed as unroadworthy, in which case the test station are duty bound to refuse to let you drive it anyway. I would think if you got stopped driving from Exeter to a pre-arranged test in Glasgow however, the powers that be regard you as taking the P and you would be done.
I would bet next months earnings that the polling station one is a bar room myth.
|
|
Don't forget that you have to be insured, though.
|
|
|
|
i have heard the polling station one although think it's only on general election and i believe it . because i saw legal paperwork that backed it up . if in the vicinity of M4/A46 weighbridge picnic area ask the old boy that runs the snack bar about his royal pardon you will get the full story...cheers...keo.
|
If you want to read some really arrogant comments by a politician with regard to cars, roads, congestion etc, go about half-way down this link and the remarks by a certain Robert Key...:-)
www.david-clelland.org.uk/050517queensspeech.htm
And people wonder why politicians are regarded in even more contempt than estate agents etc.....
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
What\'s for you won\'t pass you by
|
I believe you can also drive without an MOT to or from a garage where you are having work done for the MOT, and it doesn't have to be a testing station. Again, the rules about prior appointments apply.
The insurance is a catch-all though. As someone else said, you still have to be insured. Check your insurance policy, and you can bet your bottom dollar that it says you need a valid MOT to be covered.
But it's one of those things. I've done it, we've all done it, we have to keep doing it. Otherwise cars would essentially come to the end of their lives if the owner didn't get a new MOT before the expiry of the old one.
|
I'm sure Mark will be along later, but most (all?) policies require you to keep the car in a roadworthy condition and a only s few specifically require a MOT. I think though if you had a bump it woudl be a perfectly reasonable question for them to ask, "And why not?"
As happend to me last year with a classic, fully legal, giving it the once over before MOT. Road tested it and the exhaust manifold broke. Five weeks to get a new one. Nothing else wrong and tested later sans MOT by local station (1 mile down the road). But then I don't have the MOT/insurance problem, just the roadworthy/insurance one.
Myth though is sometimes perpetrated by Insurance Company call centres - even though policy does not state.
|
Damn, I thought I wouldn't need insurance since I thought that would be invalidated by the lack of an MOT. :(
8< Snip 8<
Racial remarks removed. DD
|
The further exemption about taking the car to somewhere to have the work carried out for an MOT is stated on the FAIL notification.
There is no limit to the distance the MOT station can be. A friend was stopped taking a car from Wales to a prebooked MOT in Leicester. After checking with the garage that they really did do MOTs on a Sunday morning, the police were perfectly satisfied.
This is a well known device for people acquiring classic (or other) cars from a long distance, and is not necessarily a fiddle. If you have a local repairer/MOT man you trust, why not bring a new purchase there to be checked, rather than using an unknown garage hundreds of miles away?
I think though you have to go straight to the MOT, not incorporate a shopping trip or a touring holiday on the way.
BTW I remember the polling station story from years ago. I even used it once, taking my parents half a mile down the road to vote in my new (old) banger that I had not yet been able to afford to tax. I think it referred to road tax, and probably dated from pre-MOT days. I'm sure it has been quietly dropped since then though.
|
|
I am not condoning driving without an MOT but IIRC it is the lightest motoring offence penalty wise, usually a fine of around £50...
|
Couple of points.
Under Section 89 Representation of the People Act 1949 a vehicle was exempt Excise Licence only when used only at elections carrying passengers to the poll without payment. Current Act is the 1983 Act of which I do not have full access so cannot confirm it still applies.
There is the offence of failing to display a current Excise Licence for which there is no exemption whilst taking it to a pre booked MOT etc.
DVD
|
DVD,
I have a feeling it's no longer applies.
|
While I would normally respect DVD's answers, the Dumfries and Galloway Police website says otherwise about exemptions. As follows:
"Q. In what circumstances do I have to display a tax disc?
A. Any 'mechanically propelled' vehicle when used or kept on a public road must display a valid tax disc.
Q. Are there any exemptions?
A. The following vehicles are exempt from displaying tax discs:
Fire engines
Ambulances
Some agricultural vehicles
Electrically propelled vehicles
Invalid carriages
Road construction vehicles
Vehicles used solely for spreading material to deal with frost, ice and snow
Vehicles are also exempt only when:
Going to a test centre for a pre-booked MOT, stipulating the time and date
On an MOT test
After failing an MOT test, for the purpose of taking the vehicle to a pre-booked appointment at a garage to have the faults rectified."
|
Thank you for that jolt Harmatten.
It made me go through the Vehicle Excise and Registration Act 1994 which states:
Section 33: offence anyone using on a road a vehicle in respect of which a vehicle excise duty is chargeable and no Licence is displayed.
Schedule 2: lists exempt vehicles amongst which is the to and from a prebooked MOT.
But Section 5 states ...no duty chargeable on a vehicle if an exempt vehicle.
So I am guilty of misinformation for which I apologise to you and the Back Room (hangs head in shame).
Can only plead must have been brought on by a Senior Moment thinking about the requirement to display a Licence when one has expired.
DVD
|
|
some of the more remote smaller offshore islands are (or were untill very recently )actually exempt from mot tests due to no testing station,the rule used to be that residents had a week to mot when coming back to mainland but motors had to be in a roadworthy condition,Oban used to be a good place to sell old cars as long as the mechanics were ok.
|
|
My Churchill policy states explicitly that the car must be maintained in a roadworthy condition and have a valid MOT certificate, if required (over three years old).
So has every other insurance policy I've ever laid eyes on. I'm sure half this stuff is 'industry standard' text.
|
So if you are never insured whilst driving to an MOT, and you need an MOT before you can get tax, and there is no exemption to getting pulled for no tax whilst on the way to an MOT....
....How can you ever drive an un-MOT'ed car to it's test???
There must be a rule somewhere that states the special exception, surely - otherwise the only way to do it would be on a trailer.
|
Double check the MOT requirement. It is there in mine as well as "kept in roadworthy condition", but the MOT requirement is in the fully comp section of the policy document not the 3rd party section. Not in the 'general' section either.
|
|
|
|
True, but you can tax your car the day before the old MoT runs out and then get it to the test centre eleven months later, if you want. I think it indicates that this provision is mainly to 'help out' people whose MoT has just expired, rather than people putting an old banger back on the road.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
