Advice re car tax

DebbieR

My son's car insurance runs out on 27th April. He's been driving for a year and when he took out his first year's insurance it was £2200 :eek: which was the cheapest we could find(from Tesco). This year, instead of going down it's actually gone up to £2400 in spite of the fact that he's had no claims and he now has 1 year's no claims bonus. We've rang several insurance companies and the cheapest we can get is 10 months cover from Admiral for £1600 paid upfront, or 12 months cover paid monthly at about £200 a month which we just can't afford .

My son has a job interview at the beginning of May and if he gets the job he needs his car as he'll be travelling to college and then on to work afterwards but he would be able to pay the car insurance himself with the wages he'd be getting.

The question is, as his car tax runs out on 30th April, is there any advantage of buying another 6 months car tax now while he still has insurance in case he does get the job or should he just notify the DVLA(or whoever - I'm not sure how to go about this) that his car is off the road and then sort it out if he does get the job? I'm not sure of the time scale of how easy it is to get your car re-taxed once you've said its off the road and with this job it'll be a case of "interview this week, start next week" IYSWIM. Can he actually get the car retaxed with the short amount of time left on his insurance anyway?

The car will be parked on our driveway, so it won't be on a public road but I'm not sure whether this affects whether it's taxed and tested or not.

Paradigm

In your situation I'd be tempted to stick 6 months tax on it, not a major cost & it's ready to go if your boy gets the job (with insurance obviously)

If you SORN it then it's OK on your drive without MOT but... if you Tax it & let the insurance lapse, it will still have to kept on your drive. You can't keep an uninsured vehicle on a public road.

derrick

Surely as the insurance runs out before the new tax disc comes into play, they won't let you tax it as there will be no insurance on the car from the tax start date!

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Hammyman

DebbieR wrote: »

The question is, as his car tax runs out on 30th April, is there any advantage of buying another 6 months car tax now while he still has insurance in case he does get the job
The car will be parked on our driveway, so it won't be on a public road but I'm not sure whether this affects whether it's taxed and tested or not.

Unless he plans on getting a tax disc starting from 1st April he can't buy one as his policy has expired by 1st May.

The car needs to be declared SORN if you don't re-tax it.

wealdroam

Also, these days if the insurance runs out it must be SORNed, and of course kept off road.

harveybobbles

Have you tired adding someone like yoiurself or someone similar age, maybe an uncle or aunty to his policy as a named driver? This will reduce the policy somewhat.

sheslookinhot

is really worth having a car if its over £2,000 to insure ?

whatmichaelsays

sheslookinhot wrote: »

is really worth having a car if its over £2,000 to insure ?

It's the reality of being a young driver unfortunately.

Premier_2

DebbieR wrote: »

... I'm not sure of the time scale of how easy it is to get your car re-taxed once you've said its off the road and with this job it'll be a case of "interview this week, start next week" IYSWIM. ...

No problem (assuming he has all the required documents) - do it the same day at a Post Office (that does car tax)

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/Motoring/OwningAVehicle/HowToTaxYourVehicle/DG_069680

DebbieR

Premier wrote: »

No problem (assuming he has all the required documents) - do it the same day at a Post Office (that does car tax)

http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/Motoring/OwningAVehicle/HowToTaxYourVehicle/DG_069680

Thanks for that information I wasn't sure how to go about it but this looks the best way to do it.

Unfortunately yes, sheslookinhot, he does really need the car if he gets the job as he finishes college at 4 and would start work at 5pm, finishing at 10pm so there's no way he could rely on public transport - our buses stop running after about 6.30pm anyway.

Thanks for everyone's help. I'm just going to keep my fingers crossed that he gets the job now!