Car Tax - Historic Vehicles - Reminders?

[GTS290N]

Hi All,
I was just double-checking the MOT date on my car and noticed the tax had lapsed on the 1st April.
It's classed as historic, so free.
Every year or six months I've had reminders from the DVLA to tax or sorn the car, but nothing this year.
Just in case this is now the standard for historic vehicles, a wee reminder.
It took seconds to tax the car (£0.00) on the dvla website.

[cliftyhanger]

I had a reminder for my spitfire at the beginning of April, and retaxed online today.

[Carledo]

Had my written reminder for renewal in April mid March and did it online a few days later no worries.

Probably just a glitch, or lost in the post (after all, 50% of stuff sent TO DVLA seems to get lost, why not the other way too?)

In one case, I sold 2 cars on the same day, so I sent 2 V5s to DVLA in the SAME envelope. one came back to the new owner fine, the other didn't. When I enquired, DVLA said they hadn't had the second one! Porkies or what?

Steve

[Graham04]

Its not that unusual for reminders to go missing. When you are not paying it is easy to forget. I started wondering about my MGB tax reminder a couple of years ago , only to find it was 4 months out of tax and 2 months out of MOT. I then had serious Corporal Jones moment . Bring back tax discs , at least you see it every time you look at the car. Graham

[xvivalve]

I tax the Aston by direct debit, I should stop doing so for two reasons; the first is it is expensive enough without paying a premium for paying and secondly I dislike the relinquish of control you give awayy with the method. Anyway, I digress, last month I suddenly thought about the Aston MoT, so checked, it must be looming, if not imminent, I thought. Wrong, it expired at the end of November last year!!!

So with no MoT being in place, they happily took the December dd, allowed me to renew the tax on line using the v62 at the end of Dec, and then continued to draw the January, February and March payment instalments; great system!

With complete impunity, or simply oblivious to the fact, in the meantime I drove the car all over the place, past camera vans anpr areas alike!

[Carledo]

I tax the Aston by direct debit, I should stop doing so for two reasons; the first is it is expensive enough without paying a premium for paying and secondly I dislike the relinquish of control you give awayy with the method. Anyway, I digress, last month I suddenly thought about the Aston MoT, so checked, it must be looming, if not imminent, I thought. Wrong, it expired at the end of November last year!!!

So with no MoT being in place, they happily took the December dd, allowed me to renew the tax on line using the v62 at the end of Dec, and then continued to draw the January, February and March payment instalments; great system!

With complete impunity, or simply oblivious to the fact, in the meantime I drove the car all over the place, past camera vans anpr areas alike!

If you pay VED annually there is no Premium

If you pay 6 monthly at the post office, the premium is 10%

If you pay monthly OR 6 monthly by DD the premium is 5%

I reckon the monthly DD is the best option as it's the most flexible. And you are never laying out money for something you're not using as a couple of clicks cancels the DD and you don't have to wait for a refund when you SORN.

When I took my Black Cav off the road last Sept the MOT had expired and I declared it SORN. That didn't stop them taking the Oct payment from my bank (my mistake really, should have cancelled the DD too) The money came back about 2 weeks later without any prompting from me, but they REALLY shouldn't have taken it in the first place!

OTOH, I have had letters saying I must get a car tested or declare it SORN as it will not be retaxed on DD as the MOT has expired.

There doesn't seem to be any consistency!

Steve

[tony g]

DVLA will email you when your mot is one month away. A second mail when theres 2 weeks to go. Theres a page somewhere:

https://www.gov.uk/mot-reminder

Tony

[sprint95m]

Support your local Post Office!

The only thing is that you cannot SORN a newly acquired vehicle, that HAS to be done online.



I have always paid for a year because that is the cheaper option (of the two available at the PO).
Paying an extra charge for Direct Debit is a complete nonsense ( or as Alun would say an "anathema") to me
and I really cannot believe that people actually do this .
It is no hardship to put money by every week (£10) to cover this (and insurance, MOT etc).




Ian.

[Carledo]

DVLA will email you when your mot is one month away. A second mail when theres 2 weeks to go. Theres a page somewhere:

https://www.gov.uk/mot-reminder

Tony

This is new! You used to have to PAY (£5 PA I think) for this service, so I never did, being, like Ian, "careful"

[Carledo]

Support your local Post Office!

The only thing is that you cannot SORN a newly acquired vehicle, that HAS to be done online.



I have always paid for a year because that is the cheaper option (of the two available at the PO).
Paying an extra charge for Direct Debit is a complete nonsense ( or as Alun would say an "anathema") to me
and I really cannot believe that people actually do this .
It is no hardship to put money by every week (£10) to cover this (and insurance, MOT etc).
Ian.

You are not paying extra for using DD, in fact, by using DD, you are getting a 50% discount on the PREMIUM for paying "in installments" which has been in operation as long as I have been driving, since back when you could tax a car every 4 months!

I would imagine £10 a week would barely cover the VED on a post 2001 Aston, let alone the insurance!!

The MOST expensive way to pay VED is now by 6 monthly payments at the PO.

Steve

[tony g]

I have a feeling the charges used to come from a 3rd party not the dvla themselves. They used a very similar web address which I thought was dodgy

Tony

DVLA will email you when your mot is one month away. A second mail when theres 2 weeks to go. Theres a page somewhere:

https://www.gov.uk/mot-reminder

Tony

This is new! You used to have to PAY (£5 PA I think) for this service, so I never did, being, like Ian, "careful"

[Carledo]

I have a feeling the charges used to come from a 3rd party not the dvla themselves. They used a very similar web address which I thought was dodgy

Tony

DVLA will email you when your mot is one month away. A second mail when theres 2 weeks to go. Theres a page somewhere:

https://www.gov.uk/mot-reminder

Tony

This is new! You used to have to PAY (£5 PA I think) for this service, so I never did, being, like Ian, "careful"

There may well be (or have been) a scam site that charged for the service, but i'm thinking of the VOSA/DVSA one that was actually mentioned on the MOT cert.

Steve

[sprint95m]

Is it

If you pay monthly OR 6 monthly by DD the premium is 5%
Steve

or

You are not paying extra for using DD, in fact, by using DD, you are getting a 50% discount on the PREMIUM for paying "in installments" which has been in operation as long as I have been driving, since back when you could tax a car every 4 months!
Steve

?

Now you have got me confused
So you can choose a monthly DD or a DD every six months, the total cost being the same for either
but this is 5% dearer than a one off payment at the Post Office?



Ian.

[Carledo]

Is it

If you pay monthly OR 6 monthly by DD the premium is 5%
Steve

or

You are not paying extra for using DD, in fact, by using DD, you are getting a 50% discount on the PREMIUM for paying "in installments" which has been in operation as long as I have been driving, since back when you could tax a car every 4 months!
Steve

?

Now you have got me confused
So you can choose a monthly DD or a DD every six months, the total cost being the same for either
but this is 5% dearer than a one off payment at the Post Office?
Ian.

That's basically it! If you pay annually, online OR at the PO, that is the base price. If you pay 6 monthly at the PO, you pay 10% more (there is no monthly PO option) If you pay monthly or 6 monthly online direct debit, you pay 5% more than the base price.

Say for example, you VED is £240PA, if you pay annually this is what you pay, online or at PO

If you pay 6 monthly at the PO you will pay £132 every 6 months (240/2 +10%) which is £264PA This is because of the PREMIUM that has always been charged for paying in installments.

If you pay 6 monthly by DD you will pay £126 every 6 months (240/2 +5%) which is £252PA

If you pay monthly by DD you will pay £21 every month (240/12 +5%) which is £252PA

In both the above cases you are paying a 50% LOWER Premium by using direct debit.

I look at it a different way round, by paying annually (in advance) DVLA has the use of your money for up to 11 months before they have "earned" it. If you sell or SORN the car during that period, you then have to WAIT for DVLA to refund YOUR money. Admittedly, with interest rates being what they are, i'm not saving the 5% by keeping the money in MY bank, but at least it's THERE if I need it, not earning interest for DVLA. And I never have to wait for a refund!

Steve

[xvivalve]

I started paying the Aston monthly, because I bought the Alfa the month the tax was due on the Aston, both are rated at £535/year. Rather than lumbering myself with an annually recurring four figure tax bill, I thought, aha, pay the Aston monthly for a few months and we’ll get all the cars staggered; paying six months at the time would have seen it coincide with another couple of cars!

Remembering this plan three months later proved harder than I’d anticipated! I have now marked my diary...