DVLA right or wrong?

perjubs

Hi.

I work as a security guard on a private site, to enter you need to go through an electronic barrier, though anyone from the public can come onto the site to visit a car spares shop, the rest of the site is used by logistics firms.

There is a part of the site rented by a car sales guy who stores excess cars that wont fit on his lot here or ones that are broken down and cant be sold. One such vehicle was declared off road and put here, however next to it some other people who have business on site had parked their fully working cars.

Yesterday a guy in a DVLA van came onsite to look around for illegal cars, in the interest of cooperation (and thinking everything was ok) I let him onsite. He spotted the car that was declared of road and clamped it. I explained to him that it was declared off road and belonged to a company that sold cars and was stored here on land rented by the company. He told me that because it was next to a public car park it was in violation of DVLA rules. I told him it wasnt a public car park it was a car park used by staff on site and was seperate to the land rented by the car sales guy. He still insisted it was against the law and left the clam on.

Is he right or not? Also, am I in my rights to deny him access in the future to prevent any more overly zealous clamping?


Thanks

Bantex_2

Let the owner of the car deal with it.

phill99

Why get involved. You seem to be the over zealous one.

DUTR

Bantex wrote: »

Let the owner of the car deal with it.

I was going to type similar.

atrixblue.-MFR-.

Morally the DVLA had no business trying to attempt to go through a locked and secured facility to hunt for them. If the general public has no access other than the workers, and those who request to go to the part shop via security gates to get in they had no business trying.


but you opened the gate and this suggests the public off the street can access the site, so in theory had you refused access they wouldn't have had issue as you waved them in this suggests you only there to open the gates for the public for courtesy purposes.


This wont create much of a headache for the guy who owns it, but it will for the landowner when he complains that you should not have let him in!.

perjubs

Because I am the one getting moaned at by people on site, not to mention my boss and as this guy comes on every three months to check it seems that every three months I am going to have to deal with either the DVLA guy telling me how much authority he has to enter or my boss complaining that Im letting him on. So frankly I dont fancy having that headache every three months.

That aside, Im friends with the guy who has been clamped and would like to find out the facts of the matter to help him and also educate myself a little bit, good to see you all had really constructive answers there though, why not just say nothing if you have nothing worthwhile to say?

BeenThroughItAll

perjubs wrote: »

... good to see you all had really constructive answers there though, why not just say nothing if you have nothing worthwhile to say?

I think 'let the car's owner sort it out' is the generally constructive and worthwhile advice, to be fair.

perjubs

atrixblue.-MFR-. wrote: »

Morally the DVLA had no business trying to attempt to go through a locked and secured facility to hunt for them. If the general public has no access other than the workers, and those who request to go to the part shop via security gates to get in they had no business trying.


but you opened the gate and this suggests the public off the street can access the site, so in theory had you refused access they wouldn't have had issue as you waved them in this suggests you only there to open the gates for the public for courtesy purposes.


This wont create much of a headache for the guy who owns it, but it will for the landowner when he complains that you should not have let him in!.

Thanks for a more constructive answer than the other folks.

But my question remains can I deny him access? I know if HMR Customs want to come on I HAVE to let them on, there is no legal way around it, I learned this when I was training however does the same apply to the DVLA? I can't seem to find anything either way about it.

DUTR

perjubs wrote: »

Because I am the one getting moaned at by people on site, not to mention my boss and as this guy comes on every three months to check it seems that every three months I am going to have to deal with either the DVLA guy telling me how much authority he has to enter or my boss complaining that Im letting him on. So frankly I dont fancy having that headache every three months.

That aside, Im friends with the guy who has been clamped and would like to find out the facts of the matter to help him and also educate myself a little bit, good to see you all had really constructive answers there though, why not just say nothing if you have nothing worthwhile to say?

If you are such a friend then encourage and inspire him to act legally, at the end of the day many posts here are about people trying to beat the system...... you can't long term.
So don't take the posts to heart, they all mean well, for the forecourt mgr, it's just some paperwork to deal with, in fairness, would you want to buy a car from them and expect them to honour a warranty of sort, if they cannot be bothered to sorn a vehicle? The DVLA didn't just randomly turn up, they had good cause to believe the vehicle(s) were not stored legally.

perjubs

BeenThroughItAll wrote: »

I think 'let the car's owner sort it out' is the generally constructive and worthwhile advice, to be fair.

Hardly, that is lazy and ignorant advice.

perjubs

DUTR wrote: »

If you are such a friend then encourage and inspire him to act legally, at the end of the day many posts here are about people trying to beat the system...... you can't long term.
So don't take the posts to heart, they all mean well, for the forecourt mgr, it's just some paperwork to deal with, in fairness, would you want to buy a car from them and expect them to honour a warranty of sort, if they cannot be bothered to sorn a vehicle? The DVLA didn't just randomly turn up, they had good cause to believe the vehicle(s) were not stored legally.

This is the point you are missing apparently, the vehicle was SORN'd as far as the owner knew he was obiding by the law by having it off the road and declaring at as such. He got clamped because someone parked next to him because that is how the land is divided.

So this isnt about trying to screw the system and win against the odds, this is about someone doing what the law says they should and the DVLA coming on and declaring the area to be a public car park when it isnt, for the simple reason that a car was parked on what is by deed a seperately owned piece of land.

And the DVLA are coming on every three months, I didnt mention that in my original post I know, but the same guy working for them comes on every three months and asks to look around. The first time he did it he found another SORND vehicle and the owner of that vehicle is now getting taken to court because the DVLA guy claims it was parked on the main road outside. So clearly the guy doing the clamping is taking the mick and going over the top for whatever reason.

Which is why I want to know, can I just tell him to !!!!!! off next time he comes, or can he legally demand access.