How much would you pay to get your car through its MOT?

lilac_lady

My car - R reg VW with 59000 miles on the clock - is due to be mot'd shortly and I've feeling that it'll need some work before it passes. How much is too much to pay for a 9 year old car to pass?

balsingh

In order to use the car, it needs an MOT so if you want to keep the car on the road, you will need to pay whatever it costs. You are not obliged to get the car sorted out by the MOT test garage. You can shop around to get the best deal. Bear the following in mind though, if the car fails its MOT, you have 7 days to get the problems sorted out.

ManAtHome

Well, given that it's probably depreciated to not a lot, £200-300 would be cheap (mine's in tomorrow, and will be hopefully cheaper than buying a new one - this is the only thing that drives my change of car these days).

Mookfish

As a general rule I'd say upto the value of the car, if its going to cost more than the cars worth scrap it and buy another one. Of course I'd be a bit flexible if I realy liked the car in question, and I think it is worth spending £500 on a car worth £500 as if you were to repace it with a car costing £500 you may be buying a car with problems.

Silent_Bob_3

Depends whats wrong with it. If its been serviced regularly and looked after you shouldnt get too many expensive bills. I look at it this way at least you know whats wrong with it and how much it would cost to fix whereas if you buy another car you dont know what might be wrong with it, which could be a huge bill when its MOT time. Stick with it and see if it fails first. So long as it not anything major in the engine I'd keep it.

mr_accountant

Well i had my mot done last week at local council testing- failed on front handbrake o/s not enough effort. I changed the caliper myself with the help of an assistant! Cost of caliper from GSF was £70, 7 day re-test was free, so £110 all in Inc the £40 mot fee.

Before buying an s/hand car you can now check what the car has failed on previous mot (if it has at least one computerised mot) and therefore you can have some idea if the next mot will be expensive. The info is on the below site. So the next time you are interested in buying a car, ask the seller for the relevant document numbers, this will give some indication of the cost if the next mot. If they refuse go elsewhere, as they know it will fail heavily next time round.

VOSA computerised mot site

http://www.motinfo.gov.uk/internet/jsp/ECSID-Internet-Status-Request.jsp

mandi

Hi Mr A,
Hope you dont mind but your link doesnt work. so here it is again..
http://www.motinfo.gov.uk/internet/jsp/ECSID-Internet-Status-Request.jsp.. my car done at a Bt Garage.. ( another MS tip)... It failed on a couple of things, the guys were brilliant, didnt charge me, told me to take all the time I wanted to sort out the problems, and only charged me £ 42.00.. :j when I took it back for the retest...

Mookfish

Another thought on the subject, if it fails because it needs welding my general rule above goes out the window. If it needs welding in 2 or 3 places it usually means its going to be ongoing, although this is unlikely on a fairly modern VW I thought it worth metioning for anyone else who reads this thread.

DM2007

1/2 half of its value - tops.

lilac_lady

Rhanks for all for your replies - it's helped me make my mind up - I'm keeping the car because it's always been looked after and serviced regularly. Hopefully the MOT won't be too much but I'm prepared to spend up to £500 if I have to because I can't afford a new VW and don't want to buy someone else's problem car.

lilac_lady

I mean thanks ....