Is the new car tax law retrospective?

sh0597

I do find the switchover a bit dodgy, I haven't exactly seen the changes plastered around the place. I have a tax disc with an august expiry, however the disc itself now means nothing.


If I sold to someone else, how many would know the car was untaxed?

Captaincodpiece

sh0597 wrote: »

I do find the switchover a bit dodgy, I haven't exactly seen the changes plastered around the place. I have a tax disc with an august expiry, however the disc itself now means nothing.


If I sold to someone else, how many would know the car was untaxed?

Makes no odds as the new buyer has to tax the car when he buys it.

Iceweasel

Captaincodpiece wrote: »

Makes no odds as the new buyer has to tax the car when he buys it.

Of course that's right Cap'n C - but it's almost a certainty that we'll get a private sale where both seller and buyer are unaware of the changes and just carry on as before.

The automatic refund going to the seller may well be the first the seller knows about it.

Even if he was to then immediately contact the buyer it would be too late to avert a DVLA fine for using an untaxed vehicle.

It don't think it will be long before it happens.

Captaincodpiece

Iceweasel wrote: »

Of course that's right Cap'n C - but it's almost a certainty that we'll get a private sale where both seller and buyer are unaware of the changes and just carry on as before.

The automatic refund going to the seller may well be the first the seller knows about it.

Even if he was to then immediately contact the buyer it would be too late to avert a DVLA fine for using an untaxed vehicle.

It don't think it will be long before it happens.

Once people get their heads round the fact it's a tax and tax is an individual responsibility it will work.

You buy a car you tax it. You sell it and anything owed comes back to you. Your tax cannot be passed on and others can't pay it for you. Simplifies it.

Cornucopia

Just checked mine, and apparently they are going to want £2.63 per month if I pay by DD. Surely it will cost them more than that to process?

loadsamunney

ok so it has happened! bought a car from a dealer on 29 oct. Its got a tax disc on it till jan2015. lovely i thought. ....not lovely .i get a fine from dvla for £38 (only costs £20 pa to tax it), they caught me on a camera and apparrantly i am in the wrong even though ive got the valid disc on the car, and noone told me when buying the car that actually, its not taxed and it was down to me to know that fact.

this absolutely stinks ,and i find it hard to believe that dvla can get away with treating the law abiding public so badly. this sounds like something martin should be getting involved in.its ludicrous!

Spicy_McHaggis

loadsamunney wrote: »

ok so it has happened! bought a car from a dealer on 29 oct. Its got a tax disc on it till jan2015. lovely i thought. ....not lovely .i get a fine from dvla for £38 (only costs £20 pa to tax it), they caught me on a camera and apparrantly i am in the wrong even though ive got the valid disc on the car, and noone told me when buying the car that actually, its not taxed and it was down to me to know that fact.

this absolutely stinks ,and i find it hard to believe that dvla can get away with treating the law abiding public so badly. this sounds like something martin should be getting involved in.its ludicrous!

But you weren't law abiding were you?

Ignorance isn't a defence.

Iceweasel

loadsamunney wrote: »

ok so it has happened! bought a car from a dealer on 29 oct. Its got a tax disc on it till jan2015. lovely i thought. ....not lovely .i get a fine from dvla for £38 (only costs £20 pa to tax it), they caught me on a camera and apparrantly i am in the wrong even though ive got the valid disc on the car, and noone told me when buying the car that actually, its not taxed and it was down to me to know that fact.

this absolutely stinks ,and i find it hard to believe that dvla can get away with treating the law abiding public so badly. this sounds like something martin should be getting involved in.its ludicrous!

Wrong! - the disc ceased to be valid the moment the previous owner sold it to the dealer.

"No-one told me" counts for nothing.

"I didn't know" will be laughed out of court if you dispute the fine.

Remember Donald Rumsfeld saying something like this:

'There are known knowns; there are things we know we know. We also know there are known unknowns; that is to say we know there are some things we do not know. But there are also unknown unknowns -- the ones we don't know we don't know.'

Some of us were predicting your predicament over a year ago when the changes were first announced.

Cornucopia

Maybe this will help?