Old car insurance valid for 24h after purchase?

katerinasol

Hi all,

I vaguely remember hearing somewhere that when you buy a car from a private buyer, his/her insurance is valid for 24 hours after purchase so that you have a chance to get it home and find out the best prices etc. Is this true or am I just making it up? If it's true, can anyone point me to some sort of official link? I've googled but can't find anything.


Many thanks

System

Even if his insurance is still valid for the vehicle it will not be legal for you to drive it on that insurance unless you are a named driver. Your DOC extension will not be valid because you own the vehicle.

It's not hard to get your insurance co to change over your insurance at a set date & time. Thousands manage this every day.

pitkin2020

katerinasol wrote: »

Hi all,

I vaguely remember hearing somewhere that when you buy a car from a private buyer, his/her insurance is valid for 24 hours after purchase so that you have a chance to get it home and find out the best prices etc. Is this true or am I just making it up? If it's true, can anyone point me to some sort of official link? I've googled but can't find anything.


Many thanks

It would only be covered if your insurance allows you drive other vehicles, the vehicle doesn't belong to do and the car has an insurance policy on it.

As to your original question, there would only be insurance on the car until the policy is cancelled. If the original owner of the car cancelled the insurance last friday but sold the car on sunday the insurance wouldn't run out 24 hours from sunday it ended on Friday. Not sure if your confused or if someone has fed you a line of BS.

As already pointed out either get your insurance to start at a specific time on the new vehicle and collect it or get a temporary insurance policy to cover it.

katerinasol

I don't need insurance any time soon, was just wondering whether this was accurate or the person telling me was misinformed. Thanks I suppose it wouldn't make sense anyway.

pitkin2020

katerinasol wrote: »

I don't need insurance any time soon, was just wondering whether this was accurate or the person telling me was misinformed. Thanks I suppose it wouldn't make sense anyway.

person telling me was misinformed very misinformed.

Andy_L

Unless the policy says it there's no cover.

ISTR that the exisitng insurer can be persued for any losses caused by an uninsured driver if the policy is still active (ie hasn't been cancelled/transfered) but the car itself is not insured from a "road-legal" point of view

mattyprice4004

No cover I'm afraid. Why would their insurance cover someone totally unrelated?