private reg swap help

korky69

hi, sorry if this sounds confusing

my wife p/x her car with a local dealer which had her personal plate on early july.
somewhere on the way she cocked up the form to switch the plates over, in that time her old car which now have the original plates on when registered (i switched them at the dealers) had been transferred to the dealer and as since sold the car, he's done all my wife asked him to do to authorize the switch as he is/was the legal owner,

however the latest form from the dvla says it cannot be switched as their is no road tax on it, the dealer says the buyer did tax it but on the gov website it comes up her personal plate untaxed & the original registered plated unknown, so there is someone driving about in her old car with an unregistered car i think?

the reg to the old car is probably worth more than the car itself , will she have lost it, not sure if the dealer can help any more and doubt she will get info on whoever bought it

any info is appreciated
ta

Minrich

The plate ownership is lost , it is likely that the plate has already been removed from the car (Hence shows as untaxed) the original plate allocated to that car will be on it (unless it has had the plate on from first date of registration , then it will have a random unissued plate assigned to the car)

dannyrst

ring the DVLA, explain the situation and see what they say.

Iceweasel

Little help now for the situation you find yourself in, but he correct thing to do is to do it yourself getting the original number reverted back and your private plate on retention.

Because it was a complicated affair in the past, lots of folks left the dealer to handle it - to their cost.

Dealers generally don't give a hoot as your personal plate means nothing to them.

It's incredibly easy to do it on-line - and very quick.

For the future - and for the benefit of others here are the links:

Take off - https://www.gov.uk/keep-registration-number

You pay £80 and it's valid for 10 years - once the online application is successful, you can use the retention certificate which will be issued by post to assign the personalised registration to a new vehicle.

Again it can be done on-line.
Put on - https://www.personalisedvehicleregistration.service.gov.uk/assign/vehicle-lookup

But beware - this is the new 'Beta' service which only works Monday to Saturday 08:00 to 18:00.

At other times those links will say 'Service Unavailable' or 'Page cannot be found'.

korky69

thanks for all the replies,

apparently the dealer, who it appears as done his best to help, suggested putting the details in and tax the old car online even though she no longer owns it, which she did do and send the transfer forms off to try again, it will cost her £15 for a months tax then to cancel it.
this doesn't sound right to me though.

she'll wait a week or so for the dvla to say yes or no before calling, but i've got a feeling she's going to be disappointed.

what happens to her plate if she does lose it?
it must be somewhere in the system if she's managed to tax it today and i'd assume they'd revert back to the original plates at 1st registration which is still unrecognisable on dvla site.

Minrich

The registration mark is assigned to the car you sold and is no longer yours as it was not transferred prior to the sale . The car and number plate have been sold to someone else who has had the log book returned to them in their name and address , they probably have then seen that the registration on the car they bought is different to the one on the car (you changed it over before dvla said you could and transferred the personal plate onto a retention certificate or another car) They may well have sold the number plate or contacted dvla about the confusion ..... Ring DVLA asap ,they will be able to tell the history and that your gf was the previous owner etc , they have all the history of plate changes etc infront of them ..... They will not speak to you about it , it will have to be your gf . The DVLA will tell you what has happened and what you can do about it . You have in my opinion little chance of getting it back .

Iceweasel

This may sound harsh but you didn't follow any of the rules for transferring a 'cherished plate'.

The car was sold before the plate had been retained - so it has rightfully gone to the new owner.

You had no authority to unscrew and change the plates at the dealers.

I would be very surprised if you can get it back from the new owner - who may already have sold it.

An expensive lesson I think.

But good luck with the DVLA and with persuading the new owner of the plate to part with it.

korky69

Iceweasel wrote: »

This may sound harsh but you didn't follow any of the rules for transferring a 'cherished plate'.

The car was sold before the plate had been retained - so it has rightfully gone to the new owner.

You had no authority to unscrew and change the plates at the dealers.

I would be very surprised if you can get it back from the new owner - who may already have sold it.

An expensive lesson I think.

But good luck with the DVLA and with persuading the new owner of the plate to part with it.

the dealer asked me to switch the plates whilst they did the paperwork,
after the 1st attempt to swap, the dealer even registered the car in his name to enable them both to swap over,
i'm guessing that having signed all the necessary papers a 2nd time he quite rightly sold it on, not sure if he explained to the buyer that the plates were being change (or so we thought)
still not sure how or even what my wife taxed whatever her plates supposed to be attached to?

korky69

Minrich wrote: »

The registration mark is assigned to the car you sold and is no longer yours as it was not transferred prior to the sale . The car and number plate have been sold to someone else who has had the log book returned to them in their name and address , they probably have then seen that the registration on the car they bought is different to the one on the car (you changed it over before dvla said you could and transferred the personal plate onto a retention certificate or another car) They may well have sold the number plate or contacted dvla about the confusion ..... Ring DVLA asap ,they will be able to tell the history and that your gf was the previous owner etc , they have all the history of plate changes etc infront of them ..... They will not speak to you about it , it will have to be your gf . The DVLA will tell you what has happened and what you can do about it . You have in my opinion little chance of getting it back .

will the dvla speak to her as she isn't the owner any more?
she had the log book (in the dealers name which he signed to swap) and posted them this morning to dvla
she'd sooner wait a week or so for the next letter than call mind.

Iceweasel

korky69 wrote: »

the dealer asked me to switch the plates whilst they did the paperwork,
after the 1st attempt to swap, the dealer even registered the car in his name to enable them both to swap over,
i'm guessing that having signed all the necessary papers a 2nd time he quite rightly sold it on, not sure if he explained to the buyer that the plates were being change (or so we thought)
still not sure how or even what my wife taxed whatever her plates supposed to be attached to?

Obviously the dealer hasn't a clue as to the correct procedure - there should have been no need for any 2nd time.

Your use of the word 'attempt' is very telling.

You can of course blame the dealer and give him a load of earache but it is actually the person who has the cherished plate's job to retrain the number.

No-one owns a number by the way - all you get is the 'right to display' and for one reason and another that right is being allowed to slip away, and pass on to someone else.

You need to take action now - not wait a week - it may already be too late.

korky69

don't think the dealer had anything to do with it so can't lay any blame on him,
the 1st "attempt" was wifes fault, didn't fill in the cheque right, by the time she'd got them back the dealer had sent his part off.
next attempt was rejected as the old car must have a keeper, so dealer put it in his own name, so all seemed ok, then rejected due to no tax.
she's hopeful it'll go through this time after taxing it and sent both log books signed by the registered keepers on both,
how this works "if" he's sold the car on with no log book?
can only guess the new owner as applied for a new 1 and got a new plate or just driving around with dodgy plates, either way neither the private or original plates had tax on, but wife said when she taxed it today the details were for the old car.

she'd always gone to the local dvla before with no problem, none left around here!