Selling a car - can they take car away same day?

Lum

JimmyTheWig wrote: »

But they could sort out their insurance once they had bought the car.
Once you've sorted out your insurance you've lost all bargaining power over the purchase.
What if the seller turns round and says "£850? It was £950 we agreed!". Are you, as the buyer, going to walk away and pay two lots of admin fees for changes to your insurance?

What I normally do, as a buyer, is get the quote from the insurance before I even go and look at the car, if I decide to buy the car then I simply call the insurance company and accept the quote.

Never had any problem with doing it this way. Beleive it or not insurance companies are generally used to people changing cars mid-policy.

JimmyTheWig

Lum wrote: »

What I normally do, as a buyer, is get the quote from the insurance before I even go and look at the car, if I decide to buy the car then I simply call the insurance company and accept the quote.

Never had any problem with doing it this way. Beleive it or not insurance companies are generally used to people changing cars mid-policy.

I did this. Still took about 20 minutes to get the quote accepted. Mainly because they kept trying to sell me extra stuff!

But in any case my point still stands. If you accept the insurance quote before actually buying the car then you've committed to it and the buyer could try to screw you over. If you don't accept the insurance quote before actually buying the car then people are saying that you shouldn't be sold the car. Puts the buyer in a bit of a catch-22, doesn't it?

(I like you solution of driving it home for them.)

Lum

Generally just bluntly saying "stop trying to sell me extras, I'm in a strangers house trying to buy a car off them" is enough to make them go away.

Problem with these call centre staff is they are required to try to sell you each and every one of these things on every call and are marked down and reprimanded for failure to do so, unless you explicitly ask them to stop they have no choice* but to go through the entire spiel.

* well I guess losing your job is a valid choice, but not one you'd really want to go for.

Joe_Horner

I'm not saying they'd use it like that (they generally don't seem to) but the point is that they weren't actually lying to Lum's dad about the possibility because the Act could reasonably be read in a way to make him liable. As she said, once they were happy he wasn't involved in any way, they didn't bother proceeding.

It's very unlikely that situation would pass the "public interest" test for prosecution, but other scenarios might arise which did.

Say, for example, a buyer says he won't bother insuring it for the drive home because it's just a mile or two. You sell it anyway, then he knocks down a heavily pregnant nun, walking her pet polar bear, as he pulls out of your drive. The nun dies and the bear and the unborn Baby Christ Child are left on life support. You knew he wasn't going to insure at a time when you still had reasonable power to prevent him but you allowed it anyway. The CPS might decide that one was worth pursuing and the wording of the law would (probably) allow them to.

pinkteapot

Sgt_Pepper wrote: »

But the 3rd party extension excludes cars you own.

:eek:

Really? My certificate just says "driving other cars" with no mention of ownership. Fortunately I've never used it to drive another car. I'll be checking my policy booklet now.

Rover_Driver

Joe_Horner wrote: »

I'm not saying they'd use it like that (they generally don't seem to) but the point is that they weren't actually lying to Lum's dad about the possibility because the Act could reasonably be read in a way to make him liable. As she said, once they were happy he wasn't involved in any way, they didn't bother proceeding.

Once the vehicle has been sold, the seller has no liability for, or control over, the actions of the buyer in respect of the car.

The act states 'cause or permit'. - The seller doesn't cause the buyer to drive the car, it's the buyers car and his decision to drive it. They can't permit the buyer to drive or not, - again, it's the buyers car, the seller has no control over what he does with it.

colino

Welcome to the world of selling cars and time wasters!
Hope you get it sold and when selling, always have the keys in your hands, unless you are sitting in the car and when they pay, count the cash, note by single note (say something like I want to make sure you haven't given me too much) and put it in your pocket.
Fill in the V5C appropriately, on signature boxes put the time as well as the date in, put the majority of the V5C in your pocket and give them the green slip and keys. Great if you have a printer at home as you can give them a copy of what you're sending off.
All done. With a private sale I wouldn't bother with a receipt, you have the cash and they have the car so why bother, they're only meaningless words in addition to the transaction both of you know thats already happened and give neither side any additional comfort in law.
Just make sure the car is nice and clean for the next caller.

colino

Oh, and forgot to mention about insurance. You don't know them, they don't know you, so what is there for you to check/believe/be responsible for? They may well have pre-insured the car, they may have a floating trade policy, they may in fact have no intention of ever insuring the car at all. It's none of your business.
What next, checking they are both licenced and good enough to drive your old car?

red_eye

pinkteapot wrote: »

Just out of curiosity OP, where did you advertise the car?

Need to sell a car of a similar value to yours and, having never sold a car, I don't know whether local paper, Auto Trader or eBay is the best route... Sounds like whatever you used has worked!

owners clubs they usually full of decent people and its free

Sgt_Pepper_2

pinkteapot wrote: »

:eek:

Really? My certificate just says "driving other cars" with no mention of ownership. Fortunately I've never used it to drive another car. I'll be checking my policy booklet now.

If it just says driving other car and nothing else, I'd suggest you can't.