I?m currently living in Switzerland, but due to uncertainty over whether I?ll have parking place at the office long term I?m driving an aging RHD Astra on UK plates and UK insurance. The insurer knows the car is abroad long term and has jacked up the premium accordingly.
My problem is the MOT is due shortly and my UK insurer says no MOT means invalid insurance.
This means a painful roundtrip back to the UK just to get the MOT.
I don?t want to get the car registered locally as to do that it would need the local ?expertise? ? which would require changing the headlights to LHD version plus it may not get through the strict emissions rules here.
The car is probably worth only £600 ish but I don?t want to buy local car only to find I?m a train commuter.
So two questions:
Does anyone know if there is an insurer/broker that would look favourably on a car being MOT less, possibly with a safety report from a garage?
Is there any way of getting an MOT somewhere between Geneva and the UK (yes I know that?s a long shot).
Thanks
Dan
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I wonder how/if Forces Personnel in Germany get MOTs without returning to the UK? Might be worth your while trying to find out. You may be able to nip over there and get one sorted out.
Just a wild thought off the top of my head.
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British Forces in Germany have their cars tested by a military testing organisation and have their cars registered with DVLA, using a special series of number plates which look like UK ones (security measure). The test equates to the UK MOT. Effectively they are UK cars, used abroad and tested to a UK standard by the Military MT sections, Won't help our man in Switzerland.
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I can't imagine any insurer being prepared to take you on in the circumstances you describe without a valid MoT. Can you not take a Friday afternoon off, drive to Dover, test on Sat am, and drive back?
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Can you not insure it with a Swiss firm? My ex-gf's father has a house in Spain, and had an ageing RHD Audi A4 Avant down there on British plates, but insured on a Spanish policy, with a Spanish firm. It was registered as "exported" with the DVLA (same as SORN?) here.
I eventually drove the car back here and sold it for him, and it hadn't had UK road tax or an MOT for the duration of its stay in Spain, so circa 4yrs ( I had to drive it from Dover to a pre booked MOT test, and then tax the vehicle with the new MOT cert, before I picked it up from the MOT testing station).
I know the Swiss are proably a bit more stringent than their Latino counterparts, but a similar arrangement might be possible........?
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How are you going to tax it without an MOT?
I had a friend who was done for no current VED while he was working in CH. He said they had occasional purges of expats vehicles.
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All these people have a "certificate" to say they're insured but have a serious accident and the company will blame the broker and vice-versa-and you'll be in prison.
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How about buying a local car of similar value, a run around? Still have the problem of offloading yours though..
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So long as you're in possesion of your insurance certificate, then you're insured for 3rd party liabilities. Surely that's all you need? Written on the cert somewhere will be something along the lines of 'nothing prevents a 3rd party from making a claim'. Sure, you may have a problem claiming for yourself if there's no MOT, but only if the lack of MOT contributed to the claim.
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Are you suggesting driving the vehicle illegallly then, DN?
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Have you seen this forum?
www.englishforum.ch/transportation-driving/41845-k...l
Looks like can stay on UK plates and driving licence for 1 year, but must be UK legal.
(much like foreigners should be over here).
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Are you suggesting driving the vehicle illegallly then DN?
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Well that's up to the OP. What I am suggesting is that even without an MOT or a tax disc, he (or she) still has 3rd party liabilty insurance in force, assuming the insurance covers Switzerland.
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Howeve rif there is an accident due to a failure that an MoT would have highlighted, then the insurance company will chase you for their money.
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>>What I am suggesting is that even without anMOT or a tax disc he (or she) still has 3rd party liabilty insurance in force assuming the insurance covers Switzerland.
I thought that the car had to be road legal for the policy to be valid... as he hasn't got an MOT, then surely the Insurance Co could refuse to pay anything?
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I think by law they have to pay out to third parties but, as suggested elsewhere in this thread, may then come back to the policy holder to recover their losses.
I thought if a car was to be outside the UK for more than twelve months it had to be exported.
If the OP spends some time in the UK during the year (Christmas, Easter, Summer hols.) visiting family/friends why not tie-in the MOT with that?
Edited by gmac on 18/06/2009 at 10:14
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Not sure I understand this post - You may not have a parking space one day so you want to run a UK reg. car instead of buying a Swiss one?
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no road tax is of no consequence to driving abroad - VED only covers UK roads. I would think about getting a local ' inspection ' while out there. To drive CH-UK-CH just for a test that you may fail is lunacy and would itself cost £300 - 400 just to drive / fuel / tolls / wear tear / 2 hotel nights and the tunnel/ferry, not to mention your time and nerves .
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Did anyone watch the programme on ex-pats in Spain last night-hardly saw a Spanish registered vehicle!
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"no road tax is of no consequence to driving abroad - VED only covers UK roads."
You may not be right - my guess is that permission to use a UK registered car in Switzerland may well be conditional on it meeting all UK road traffic law, so it not being MoTd nor taxed may well breach that permission.
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As far as I'm aware for your car to be legal abroad it must be fully legal in its home country, ie your MOT, tax and insurance all has to be current and valid.
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It says on the DVLA website that it all depends whether the car is abroad for longer than 12 months. If longer, it becomes permanently exported, you can't tax it, you have to fill in an export V-something.
If less than 12 months, it has to be taxed. There is an interesting quirk; you cannot SORN a car that is abroad, but you can (must) tax it. So if the tax lapses within the 12 months it becomes illegal and there is nothing you can do to legalise it. (Except possibly depositing it on British territory, eg an embassy car park?)
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So if the tax lapses within the 12 months it becomes illegal and there is nothing you can do to legalise it. (Except possibly depositing it on British territory eg an embassy car park?)
You can renew the tax online (provided all is OK with AskMID and MOT is valid) and this will be sent to the registered UK address. OK, you are not displaying a valid tax disk abroad but it will show up on the computer as taxed.
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I have been working in Germany for the greater part of the last 5 years and, before that, various other European countries.
I have found no way around this so I make sure that MOT and service are all "date adjusted" to fit with my Christmas time back in the Ole U of K.
Then I pre-book the service and MOT and drive straight there from the ferry.
With such a car as the O.P has I would simply park it up at my CH accommodation and buy a local vehicle for a few hundred ?.
Rgds
Z
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Sorry for the slow update - work gets in the way some times;
In answer to some questions
I've bought an S max locally for family driving; the Astra is just a work and back run about.
I'll find out about parking at work in the next month or two ? if I get a space I?ll buy a car locally, if not the Astra will go ? back to the UK or to the dump and I?ll be a ?pendulaire? = train commuter
The tax doesn't run out till December and the insurance runs till November, so MOT is the only issue.
You can only get Swiss insurance with Swiss plates, hence the registration info/expertise/headlights cost ? sorry that wasn?t clear.
So what I?m looking for is if there is a way of getting MOT or MOT less insurance to last till November ? if not the car has to go back for an MOT in the next few weeks.
The timings is inconvenient ? and entirely my fault for not having spotted this and done something earlier when I had time (we were back in the UK at Easter so should have done it then).
To make things worse I am too busy at work/play to get to the UK and back so SWMBO is going to have to do it solo ? hence the priority to find a peace making alternative.
Thanks for the help
Dan
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