Help please, no V5 for car purchase

daveyjp

Last few cars I've bought from main dealers the V5 transfer, tax refund for trade in and tax on new car have been done on handover using the online system and confirmation given to me.

A new V5 and refund of tax on old vehicle has always arrived within a couple of weeks.

Mutton_Geoff

You can check if the car is still taxed here - https://www.gov.uk/check-vehicle-tax but even a positive result does not mean the previous owner suddenly remembers they sold it and cancel the tax for a refund tomorrow.

Talking of owners, without the V5, how can you/the retailer be sure how many previous owners the car had, and who that was (rental company?)

diystarter7

Bigwheels1111 said:

The only issue I see is Road tax.
Is it being taxed by the garage, if not you won’t have the green slip.
So will not be able to tax it.
My friend purchased a 4 month old motability car from the dealer, owner had passed away.
April last year. No log book as family could not find it.
Dealer taxed it as such, not needing to pay for road tax yet anyway.
V5 turned up 3 weeks later.

Hi

The main dealer will never put on the road a car without its VED
They have a system in place to get it taxed without the V5
Goolge it if you wish.
Thanks

Herzlos

Don't pay for a car until you can see the V5. Best case is you buy a car you can't tax and use for a while, and you're looking at all kinds of bureaucratic problems if it goes wrong.

A dealer would take the V5 if they bought it directly from the previous owner, so it's presumably come from an auction.

I'd certainly investigate trying to find a car that has all of the paperwork in order first. The dealer shouldn't have a problem refunding the deposit if they can't source you one.

silvercar

I’m selling my car at the moment and have just taken my private plate off it, so I am waiting for the new V5 to arrive. None of the people I’ve spoken to are the slightest bit bothered by this. The gov website shows it is taxed and recently MOT’d so I guess that is enough to satisfy everyone that it’s all genuine.

diystarter7

silvercar said:

I’m selling my car at the moment and have just taken my private plate off it, so I am waiting for the new V5 to arrive. None of the people I’ve spoken to are the slightest bit bothered by this. The gov website shows it is taxed and recently MOT’d so I guess that is enough to satisfy everyone that it’s all genuine.

Hi
Everyone is different and personally, I'd buy from a main dealer but possibly not a privateer.

Having stated the above, if i was buying a car privately, there was evidence of when they bought it, what the private reg was, service history and saw the old V5 that tied in with the retention docs etc and the address matched to a nice house etc the car was purchased by - i'd do one of those on line checks via vin numbers and if all sounded good, I'd buy

But like I said we are all different but I'd certainly buy from a main dealer and many years ago when i bought an 18 month old merc i did not get the log book for 2 weeks but I was not worried at all as the car with years tax as part of our deal with the dealer.

Thanks

EssexExile

silvercar said:

I’m selling my car at the moment and have just taken my private plate off it, so I am waiting for the new V5 to arrive. None of the people I’ve spoken to are the slightest bit bothered by this. The gov website shows it is taxed and recently MOT’d so I guess that is enough to satisfy everyone that it’s all genuine.

Can the new owner tax it without the documents?

silvercar

EssexExile said:

silvercar said:

I’m selling my car at the moment and have just taken my private plate off it, so I am waiting for the new V5 to arrive. None of the people I’ve spoken to are the slightest bit bothered by this. The gov website shows it is taxed and recently MOT’d so I guess that is enough to satisfy everyone that it’s all genuine.

Can the new owner tax it without the documents?

I don't know. I've "sold" it today through Motorway, made clear that I don't have the V5 yet and they weren't bothered, I guess they are used to it. Someone somewhere has triggered something online because from yesterday it shows up with its original reg number all the correct MOT and tax details, so some data transfer has been done. 

diystarter7

Hi

Re private reg

About a year ago when my car was about a year old one of our son's put our private reg on my car - from memory, it was done there and then as we had the v5 and the retention docs - we sent off the old v5 to dvla and got that back quickly as well - its instant during weekdays I think

As I said on this thread a while back, dealers don't often have logbooks/v5 to hand but they can tax a car/etc, its no big deal. However, I'd think twice about buying from an individual unless I could satisfy myself it was ok via my checks and using one of those car details checkers.

Don't forget to change your insurance details, lol.

Thanks

silvercar

diystarter7 said:

Hi

Re private reg

About a year ago when my car was about a year old one of our son's put our private reg on my car - from memory, it was done there and then as we had the v5 and the retention docs - we sent off the old v5 to dvla and got that back quickly as well - its instant during weekdays I think

As I said on this thread a while back, dealers don't often have logbooks/v5 to hand but they can tax a car/etc, its no big deal. However, I'd think twice about buying from an individual unless I could satisfy myself it was ok via my checks and using one of those car details checkers.

Don't forget to change your insurance details, lol.

Thanks

Changing insurance details is an interesting one.

If the sale goes through in the next few days and the car gets picked up quickly I’m tempted not to bother. It’s on the driveway at the moment. My logic is this:
a) if I change the number plate with insurance they may well charge me say £25.
b) I will have a gap between cars of a month at least, so I would need to cancel the remaining time on the insurance, this will also incur a charge. My insurance runs out in February in any case.
c) if I keep the insurance going there is no chance of having a claim from the car being involved in some 3rd party liability claim as the (private) number plate insured isn’t actually on the vehicle, so there is no connection between my private plate, my insurance and the car when sold.
d) if I keep the insurance going until it runs out in February, that’s another year no claims. If I cancel before the year end, I lose the part year. It also means the time I’ve had insurance (for preserving my no claims discount) clock starts a couple of months later.

is my logic correct?