Mike199
New Member
Hi guys,
Mike here, new member.
Got myself into a bit of a pickle.I have a Mercedes E Class on Agility (PCP) finance and I am the holder of V5/registered keeper etc. I put down a large deposit (33% of total value) and structured the deal with MB in a way that I'd make monthly payments and have roughly the same amount as the deposit to settle the car at the end of the three year deal. It might not make sense to some, but anyway, that's just the way we chose to do it at the time. There's only about 35% of finance to pay off including the settle fee.
Anyway, I want to go abroad. I've had company cars etc in the past and have taken the Ferry/Eurotunnel to France loads of times and didn't consider whether this was actually allowed at the time. They were just day trips and had no issue. I did the same with a family car (Ford Focus) that we had at the time about five years ago and went to France/Spain for a week.
I've got a shortish term role in Greece with the possibility of me staying for a good few years potentially one, two, three or more. Once the car is in Greece I'd have no problems because I've got a shipping agent out there who has explained to me the way to do it which is have the car as a temporary import as long as possible, legally six months initially and then also legally customs can extend it three months at a time depending on my employment length because it makes sense to keep it as temporary import rather than reregistering it on Greek plates and then having to do the opposite if I return after 12 months. Everything to do with insurance etc is fine.
Now I've got two stumbling blocks that I didn't consider and this is partly my fault and partly the shipping company. I thought about driving, and actually if I put it on the ferry/eurotunnel to France I reckon I'd have no problem, but I wanted to ship because it's not too dis-similar in price and it's easier. Couple of things that concern me - at no point did anyone tell me or inform me that there could be an issue with customs allowing the car to ship on the South Coast if it has outstanding finance (shipping company has copies of V5 in my name) and at no point did I know that Mercedes Finance have limitations on doing this. As far as I am aware they allow a 2 week trip to Spain for example but not longer than 30 days (although I'm guessing they'd have hard time getting a car back once it's gone anyway regardless of time limit) and they get funny about certain countries like Greece.
I see why there are restrictions in place to stop people stealing cars and financing cars and then moving them abroad, but my intentions are honest. I was going to pay off the remaining 8 or so months as usual as a monthly payment and then settle the remaining figure at end, by which time if I needed to fully register the car permanently in Greece and register on Greek plates I'd have no issue because I'd have full ownership. It was discussed with the agent that you can't register/permanently import a car that has finance but you can drive it as a temporary import within the EU with no issue.
The car now isn't in my possession and is at the port being ready to be shipped tomorrow as I dropped it off on Monday morning, and I am very nervous considering I just researched this about an hour ago. The conversation with the shipping company was pretty much I explained the situation to them and they said "OK we just need payment and a copy of V5" and that was it. No mention about anything else so I didn't consider the finance issue or ownership issue.
Does anyone have any experience with taking a car with outstanding finance abroad? I'm sure loads have done it to Spain or France without issue but that's self-drive....I've got a feeling because of the amount of cars stolen etc when shipping customs might be tight and my bright shinning white E class might attract attention.
Mike here, new member.
Got myself into a bit of a pickle.I have a Mercedes E Class on Agility (PCP) finance and I am the holder of V5/registered keeper etc. I put down a large deposit (33% of total value) and structured the deal with MB in a way that I'd make monthly payments and have roughly the same amount as the deposit to settle the car at the end of the three year deal. It might not make sense to some, but anyway, that's just the way we chose to do it at the time. There's only about 35% of finance to pay off including the settle fee.
Anyway, I want to go abroad. I've had company cars etc in the past and have taken the Ferry/Eurotunnel to France loads of times and didn't consider whether this was actually allowed at the time. They were just day trips and had no issue. I did the same with a family car (Ford Focus) that we had at the time about five years ago and went to France/Spain for a week.
I've got a shortish term role in Greece with the possibility of me staying for a good few years potentially one, two, three or more. Once the car is in Greece I'd have no problems because I've got a shipping agent out there who has explained to me the way to do it which is have the car as a temporary import as long as possible, legally six months initially and then also legally customs can extend it three months at a time depending on my employment length because it makes sense to keep it as temporary import rather than reregistering it on Greek plates and then having to do the opposite if I return after 12 months. Everything to do with insurance etc is fine.
Now I've got two stumbling blocks that I didn't consider and this is partly my fault and partly the shipping company. I thought about driving, and actually if I put it on the ferry/eurotunnel to France I reckon I'd have no problem, but I wanted to ship because it's not too dis-similar in price and it's easier. Couple of things that concern me - at no point did anyone tell me or inform me that there could be an issue with customs allowing the car to ship on the South Coast if it has outstanding finance (shipping company has copies of V5 in my name) and at no point did I know that Mercedes Finance have limitations on doing this. As far as I am aware they allow a 2 week trip to Spain for example but not longer than 30 days (although I'm guessing they'd have hard time getting a car back once it's gone anyway regardless of time limit) and they get funny about certain countries like Greece.
I see why there are restrictions in place to stop people stealing cars and financing cars and then moving them abroad, but my intentions are honest. I was going to pay off the remaining 8 or so months as usual as a monthly payment and then settle the remaining figure at end, by which time if I needed to fully register the car permanently in Greece and register on Greek plates I'd have no issue because I'd have full ownership. It was discussed with the agent that you can't register/permanently import a car that has finance but you can drive it as a temporary import within the EU with no issue.
The car now isn't in my possession and is at the port being ready to be shipped tomorrow as I dropped it off on Monday morning, and I am very nervous considering I just researched this about an hour ago. The conversation with the shipping company was pretty much I explained the situation to them and they said "OK we just need payment and a copy of V5" and that was it. No mention about anything else so I didn't consider the finance issue or ownership issue.
Does anyone have any experience with taking a car with outstanding finance abroad? I'm sure loads have done it to Spain or France without issue but that's self-drive....I've got a feeling because of the amount of cars stolen etc when shipping customs might be tight and my bright shinning white E class might attract attention.
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