buying road tax in the post office

[welland99]

I haven't bought road tax in the post office for years, but i tried it today. What a waste of time!

Unfortunately, i couldn't use the online service this time, because it is for a vehicle i just bought without tax. The seller couldn't buy tax for me because they were not insured. Furthermore, my insurance company won't email me a certificate, saying i must wait for the post to bring it.

I thought the post office would have a way to check the MID online, but they said they can't do this. This is ridiculous.

(But they can check MOT online, but that's no help as I have the MOT certificate.)

Going to try again tomorrow with a print from MID website which shows the vehicle is insured. Has anybody else tried this?

 

[neilrr]

Post Office® | Counter services | Licences and car tax | Car tax

 

[219]

I doubt they will accept anything other than a valid certificate of insurance : I had the same difficulty when I bought my 500 - insured the car online the day before collecting , had an email confirming the car was insured as of noon that day , which was before the time I collected it , and got it with the new MOT issued that morning - so I was legally able to 'drive home from the MOT ' with the above paperwork plus the new keeper section of the V5 in my possession .

Once home , I took everything down to the post office , including email from ins co confirming car was insured but , as I suspected , they would only accept the certificate as per their rules .

In the end I taxed the car online , after agreeing with the previous owner that he would forward the disc , and put a printout of the confirmation that tax had been applied for in the windscreen for the few days it took the disc to arrive . Strictly speaking this is failure to display , but a very minor non endorseable offence with a small fine being the only penalty , so I risked it and was OK .

 

[TDE1]

That's daft. Wouldnt take them a moment to attach your Certificate to an email. I assume you don't use a local broker - you could have popped in to collect one?

 

[raymont]

Silly thing is that having a 'valid' insurance certificate is not proof of current insurance. A popular scam is to insure the car, get the certificate, cancel the insurance and keep the certificate.

MID isn't 100% accurate not least because cover information can take some time to appear on the database.

 

[sinewave]

Same goes for the Tax disc.

Putting an online conformation printout in the screen is still a waste of time as the law states you have to display a proper valid tax disc not just have one 'in-the-post' or 'somewhere'

Anyone could knock up a fake conformation printout on a PC in 10 mins.

 

[219]

It only takes seconds to print out , and most reasonable cops would accept it .

An empty windscreen is a certain 'failure to display' .

It is lawful to drive without the disc for up to five days after expiry of a previous disc, provided the application has been made online before the old one expired .

Unfortunately this does not apply when a disc is applied for against a vehicle which was not previously taxed .

 

[219]

Silly thing is that having a 'valid' insurance certificate is not proof of current insurance.

Legally , it is .

A certificate of insurance is a legal document certifying that insurance is in force . There is recent case law where police forces have been reprimanded for refusing to accept a certificate produced at the roadside when 'the computer said no' and it turned out later that the insurance was valid - after the car had been seized .

If someone cancels a policy then fails to either return the certificate or destroy and confirm , then they are guilty of other offences , including fraud , besides the insurance co who issued the cert still being on risk and liable to pay third party claims .

 

[davidjpowell]

Post office will accept a faxed certificate

 

[219]

Mine said it had to be the original cert , not a copy .

However , some insurers will send it as a PDF file and allow you to print it .

Sounds like different post offices interpret the rules differently .

 

[Deleted member 37751]

Road tax, or whatever the official name is, must be the hardest tax to pay known to man.

 

[mejermy]

LV= were happy to issue a certificate by email when I renewed in March. When I queried this, as it had never been the practice previously with any insurers,they said they had changed their rules and would now be emailing where requested. When printed on a good machine indistinguishable from the original.

 

[raymont]

Post office will accept a faxed certificate

Post Office will almost certainly accept a faked certificate.

It would only take a few minutes to scan / edit / print an existing certificate.


Pontoneer.

Are you sure about the 3rd party cover continuing to be provided if the certificate is not returned?

Case study ( from AA)

Mr P loses car; picks up 6 points and a £300 fine

Mr P bought his car insurance through AA Insurance in January 2009, electing to pay a deposit and meet the balance through direct debit payments. However, once his documents were delivered he cancelled the direct debit mandate. Several attempts to persuade Mr P to reinstate the mandate failed. Eventually he was warned that his policy would be cancelled (including a letter sent by recorded delivery) and cover was stopped in April. He was asked to return the insurance certificate, which he declined to do.

In May Mr. P was stopped by police whose automatic number plate recognition equipment alerted them that the car appeared not to be insured. Mr P showed the officers his apparently valid certificate of insurance but they nevertheless contacted the Motor Insurance Database police helpline which confirmed that the certificate was no longer valid. The AA similarly confirmed that the insurance had not been reinstated. Mr P's car was confiscated on the spot and he was charged with driving without insurance. Evidence came to light that Mr. P had similarly defrauded insurers over the previous two years so the court fined him £300 and his license was endorsed with 6 points.

 

[219]

Yes , in the case you describe where police were able to verify directly with the insurer that no cover exists ( although checks with call centers have been wrong too ) the driver would be guilty of fraud .

However , even in that situation , had Mr P been involved in an accident , his insurer would still have been liable for a third party claim since they were the most recent insurer to have covered that driver and vehicle . There is a term along the lines of RTA insurer or somesuch , but basically any insurer who can be found to have been covering the vehicle recently can be held liable for any damage or injury it causes to a third party .

 

[219]

I should add that the case I read about recently involved a driver being stopped at night because the database showed his car to be uninsured , despite the driver producing a certificate , the company could not be contacted on the telephone to verify .

The car was seized and the driver left to make his own way home . After the driver kicked up stink with his insurer , it turned out he was insured but due to some clerical error it had not been recorded on the database . By the time this was resolved the car , low ish value , had been crushed - so driver sued the police where the judge ordered them to pay compensation and ruled that where the certificate and database disagree , the certificate is a legal document and must be accepted - UNLESS police can verify by speaking to the insurer that policy had been in place but then subsequently cancelled .

Even then , third party liability continues if driver hits someone .

 

[stevieb15]

Road tax, or whatever the official name is, must be the hardest tax to pay known to man.

And a ridiculous waste of time when the easiest method of collection would be to add x pence to the VAT rate on fuel, thereby the biggest users would pay the most and occasional users the least.
The only downsides I can think of are, the check on MOT and insurance needed to get disc and a reduction in state cash flow as RFL is currently paid in advance.

 

[Benzowner]

And a ridiculous waste of time when the easiest method of collection would be to add x pence to the VAT rate on fuel, thereby the biggest users would pay the most and occasional users the least.
The only downsides I can think of are, the check on MOT and insurance needed to get disc and a reduction in state cash flow as RFL is currently paid in advance.

Problem is, people with zero road tax on their car would then be paying road tax via the VAT route.

On the question of faxed insurance documents, recently taxed mine at the PO, no problem at all, but, and I may have misread this, I thought it said fax copies of cert of ins not allowed.

 

[Shude]

Problem is, people with zero road tax on their car would then be paying road tax via the VAT route.

That is not the problem at all.

The problem is that RFL is only paid when the other documents are in place and right now there is no easy way to prove you have valid MOT and insurance at the filling station.

 

[jaymanek]

Post Office will accept an email certificate and a faxed certificate.. but it HAS to be the certificate, not the covering letter or similar.

 

[raymont]

Yes , in the case you describe where police were able to verify directly with the insurer that no cover exists ( although checks with call centers have been wrong too ) the driver would be guilty of fraud .

However , even in that situation , had Mr P been involved in an accident , his insurer would still have been liable for a third party claim since they were the most recent insurer to have covered that driver and vehicle . There is a term along the lines of RTA insurer or somesuch , but basically any insurer who can be found to have been covering the vehicle recently can be held liable for any damage or injury it causes to a third party .

He wasn't charged with fraud, he was charged with having no insurance because he didn't have any. Why would this situation ( not having insurance) suddenly change if he was involved in an accident? What does recently mean in this context, days, weeks, months? Does the recent insurer you refer to have to be the current owner or can it be several owners ago? Why do we have to worry about having an accident with uninsured drivers if what you say is true as it's quite likely that the car involved would have been insured at some time in its life?