Beware new tax disc rules

From October 1 this year, the traditional paper tax disc will cease to exist. So it’s important for all Dubbers to know the new rules to avoid getting lumped with a hefty fine…

Under new regulations, motorists will have to register their car online to pay Vehicle Excise Duty, or road tax. This can be done via direct debit on the DVLA website [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] or at a post office. Those who don’t register run the risk of being caught out by number plate recognition cameras dotted around the country.


But there’s also important repercussions for those buying a secondhand VW. The new rules say that buyers no longer benefit if there’s months left on the disc, as the vehicle tax will no longer be transferred with the car. So, gone are the days of, “okay, mate, you’ve got a deal if you chuck in the tax disc,” because buyers will have to renew their tax disc straight away, or risk driving away in an untaxed motor.


It works the other way too. The seller must inform the DVLA of a change of car ownership, or face a possible fine of £1,000. Sellers will automatically get a refund for any full calendar months left on the disc, assuming they’ve filled out a V5C form.

I can see other areas for possible confusion; from October, a driver, not the registered owner, can be issued a non-endorsable fixed penalty for driving an untaxed car. But how can the driver be certain a car is taxed when it’s all done online and there’s no tax disc flapping around in the windscreen?

The answer lies at the DVLA page [You must be registered and logged in to see this link.] (See example below) So if you’re in the habit of jumping in someone else’s car it occurs to me that it might be worth having it as a bookmark on your smartphone… By inputting the car’s registration, this page will allow you to confirm when the current tax disc expires and MoT expires and its SORN status. Actually, it’s also a useful link for those viewing cars for sale because it will also confirm the colour, engine size and year of manufacture so you’ll instantly be able to tell if the vendor’s telling fibs or not…

Owners who don’t register their cars as being off the road (SORN’d) face an £80 fine for using an untaxed vehicle and can also be charged any back tax.

There is a positive to the new regulations: from October it’s expected that you will be able to pay your road tax by monthly installments which should help the finances!


[You must be registered and logged in to see this image.]

glad there reducing the costs too, its currently a 10% surcharge is added for 6 months, this is coming down to 5%

As usual this will benefit the government by making more money out of the system, If you sell a car mid-month you will not be able to claim that month’s tax back and as you cannot transfer the disc the new owner will have to buy a new disc from the beginning of the month so effectively the government are paid twice for that month’s tax for the same vehicle.

Just a rough cut guess.

About 7 million used vehicles get sold every year. If the average vehicle has half a month’s VED remaining, that equates to 3.5 million extra months of VED per year (291,666 years’ worth) down the drain (you can only claim back full months). If the average annual VED cost per vehicle is £200, that works out to about £58,333,200 every year, assuming the car is re-taxed and the original owner buys an taxes another car in the same month, so it's rather tenuous really.

So say you buy a car privately on ebay or were ever,so you roll up at the weekend and say ok I'll have it..how do you drive it away, the guys in a hurry to do the deal but there's no tax...
And has you don't yet own it as the DVLA is concerned you cant tax it!

Its ridiculous..

you tax online, as a new keeper, enter new address etc, you can pay monthly, it will basically be like buying insurance.

Still the same old story SCREW the motorist

So what happens if you travel a couple of hundred miles to view and possible buy a car on a Sunday, you won't be able to tax it unless you have internet access so you will have to go back on another day to collect it which is barmy!!!!

Beetle-ink wrote:

So what happens if you travel a couple of hundred miles to view and possible buy a car on a Sunday, you won't be able to tax it unless you have internet access so you will have to go back on another day to collect it which is barmy!!!!

I don't think they have thought of that one but then do they ever think?

again is the same scenario as insurance

Danny wrote:

again is the same scenario as insurance

Yes but with Insurance you can take out 24 hour cover just incase and it won't cost the earth if you don't buy it

It also means car sellers now will all have to have trade plates or no test drive. It's no longer the vehicle which is taxed but the registered keeper.

You can't tax the car until you register it in your name, the dealer will not do that for the time they have it on their forecourt as it adds admin costs and an extra owner to the V5C.

An additional thought, if the tax disc holder is left in the bottom left hand side of the windscreen within the swept area will this now be an MOT failure as it will be blocking the view out. It is no longer a legal requirement therefore does it have to be removed ? It's about the same size as some earlier sat-nav holders which were suckered to the windscreen and cause for MOT failure. Even at the bottom of the windscreen, if it was within the swept area, it was an MOT fail.

I don't see a problem really, push comes to shove ring the automated phone line

And what will that achieve

Beetle-ink wrote:

And what will that achieve

I get where your coming from, it can be difficult trying to do stuff via automated telephones, I remember a couple of years back while in London I tried to do this for parking and in the end I gave up and found somewhere else where there was a simple meter, I can see that there will be issues and some of us are going to get quite mad at the time especially if we expect to drive a newly bought car back home and we can't because the service isn't available. The old way was much better and simpler, the only advantage I see with this change is the option to pay monthly which some people will appreciate, having said that I can still see there is going to be some serious problems for a time to come.

Who said you can't tax unless the cars in your name? That's not anything I have read! If had it explained to me you can do it online or ring and give the new address where the car will be registered to,

And other good thing it will stop tyre kickers wanting something for nothing, "oh really like the car but the tax is running out " are you buying the car or the tax?

Danny wrote:

Who said you can't tax unless the cars in your name? That's not anything I have read! If had it explained to me you can do it online or ring and give the new address where the car will be registered to,

This is a good question Danny and I can tell you that here in Drayton I have had trouble taxing a car that wasn't in my name at the local PO

That's the post office staff not doing there job properly. If you got correct documents there isn't an issue

80% of the time Zoe goes and does it for me because I'm at work, never had an issue

Danny wrote:

That's the post office staff not doing there job properly. If you got correct documents there isn't an issue

I agree its down to the PO staff and I always have the right paperwork so this should never be an issues but I get this issue at least every other year, and I think the same will happen when trying to do it via the phone? however I have never had any probs doing it on line, I think the main problem is going to be DVLA working out the refunds etc especially if you change your car several times, not to sure how this works for dealers? I assume they will all have to have trade plates from here on?

Traders should have plates anyway, I had trade plates when I worked for myself, if they don't what are they hiding? Should you be buying a car from them?

Danny wrote:

80% of the time Zoe goes and does it for me because I'm at work, never had an issue

Are now I see what you mean. What I am saying is that if the Reg has a different name on it to the insurance although all parties are insured here in Drayton they always insist that the owners name has to be first on the insurance before they will tax it which I know isn't the case but my point is that there will be a great deal of human error for quite some time to come.

Danny wrote:

Traders should have plates anyway, I had trade plates when I worked for myself, if they don't what are they hiding? Should you be buying a car from them?

I've bought a couple of cars in the past from traders but they never displayed any plates so I assumed they must have some global insurance?

Another question I have is who informs DVLA of the transfer? assuming its the seller? surely then you would have to wait for them to do that first before you can tax it? and how quickly does the insurance database update DVLA?