MOT advice

pink_boots

My old banger is due it's MOT end of July. I have heard that I can put it through a month earlier. What I am wondering is, if it fails can I still lawfully drive it until it's proper MOT date. Giving me a chance to get whatever it failed on, fixed in time for that MOT. Thank you.

AdrianC

A fail doesn't cancel the old certificate - that remains valid until the expiry date on it.

BUT... if the car's unroadworthy, then it's illegal to drive - whether you've taken it in for an MOT or not.

Joe_Horner

It kind of depends on what it fails on (if it fails).

You'll still have a valid MOT because the old one does NOT get cancelled by a failure.

But you'll be driving a car that you know isn't up to MOT standard so, if you're stopped and the car's checked, then you won't have any excuse. Whether or not that matters really depends on what, if anything, it fails on.

For example, if it fails on tyres then you won't be able to legally drive it until the tyres are replaced. But as soon as they are, you'll be legal again until the end of your old MOT. Same applies to things liek steering, brakes, corrosion etc.

On the other hand, if it fails on something like rear seat belts and you don't use the rear seats, or headlights and you don't drive at night, then you can carry on while you get the repairs done.

An emissions fail is similar in that - unless it's clouds of black smoke - the chances of getting stopped and roadside tested in the next month is very slim indeed.

Finally, bear in mnd that any of the points above technically apply even if you don't get it tested yet - if you have bald tyres or faulty brakes, steering etc, then you're alreay driving illegally whether or not a tester has told you they're faulty. The only difference is that after a fail you couldn't mitigate any charge by claiming you didn't know.

Ebe_Scrooge

Yes, this old chestnut comes up time and again. In a nutshell, you wouldn't be done for having no MOT, but you could be done for driving an unroadworthy vehicle - as you could at any time.

As a slight aside, ignorance is generally no defence - as a driver, it is deemed to be your responsibility to make sure your vehicle is roadworthy any time it is on the road.

This was brought home to me a few years ago. I was driving through a 30 mph zone, got pulled over by the police. They were pulling lots of vehicles over. One PC came over to the window to talk to me, meanwhile his mate was walking round the car looking at tyres, lights, etc. The upshot was that I'd been doing 34 mph, he gave me the usual spiel about "naughty boy, don't do it again", and sent me on my way. Meanwhile, the car that had been in front of me, doing exactly the same speed - I saw them giving him a ticket. Don't know if that was for speeding, defective vehicle, or both. But I reckon that because my car was completely "roadworthy" and they couldn't see anything wrong with it, they were more lenient over the speeding - and I think 34 in a 30 zone is probably in the realms of "at the officer's discretion", I'm not sure ?

Sorry for waffling ! But the point is you can be done for an unroadworthy vehicle at any time, irrespective of the state of your MOT certificate. All that means is the car was roadworthy at the precise moment they tested it. You could drive out of the MOT testing place and a bulb could blow, for instance.

wildincrawley

Agree with all the legal points above, good advice. I would just add, in "moneysaving" terms, remember if you get a retest within 2 weeks, you do not have to pay for a full test again, so if it fails, I would aim to get it sorted within 2 weeks.