Ex-motability car still exempt from London charges

eldn

Hi,

I purchased a used vehicle that, according to the dealer who sold it to me, was a Motability vehicle.
When I registered for Auto-Pay London Road User to automatically pay for tunnels or congestion charges, it showed the vehicle is "exempt" from both of them.

However, I have already received the V5C and I am the Registered Keeper. It's been only 1 week since I have received it. I am wondering whether it is my legal responsibility to update DVLA or/and TFL about the fact that this vehicle is no longer a motability car? The dealer never mentioned that to me. I want to avoid any backdated fines so I set up Auto-Pay on purpose to let TFL charge me when it's required but if it keeps showing "exempt", I am not actually charged for anything.

I can of course contact TfL to be safe but I am just wondering if it's normal that it wasn't updated automatically when the new V5C was issued?

Thanks.
El

paul_c123

What does it say for "Taxation Class" on your V5C?

eldn

Alternative fuel car (M1) 

It is a hybrid (HEV) car which I believe shouldn't make it exempt from those charges so it must be about the previous Motability status.

EDIT: interesting, I made the "check your vehicle" on the TfL website (without being logged to any account) and it says I need to pay all the charges (as expected) based on the registration plate. But when I created the Auto-Pay account and added the vehicle, it shows it's exempt. Very strange, both systems are not synchronised. However the Auto-Pay account is more important as it's the one that decides whether to charge or not, so I guess it's using another backend system and it's not up-to-date somehow...

EDIT 2: well actually it says that the "check your vehicle" doesn't include discounts/exempts ("Discounts and exemptions will only show when you're signed in and paying for charges.") so that explains why only Auto-Pay page says "exempt". So back to square one, it seems the car is still considered as Motability....

paul_c123

It sounds like the dealer has correctly changed the tax class but quite recently. TfL are notorious for not updating their records in a timely manner. You'd need to delve deeply into TfL's terms and conditions to see if you have an obligation to inform them of incorrect information due to their systems being slow and/or incorrect. 

eldn

Thanks - that must be it. I read almost all the relevant sections of the T&C and could only see that if you already have an account and you are no longer motability/blue badge holder, you must update your account. But nothing about a new owner creating an account... In fact, if I didn't know it was a motability car before, I'd have set Auto-Pay and just trusted it without even checking it... 

I will contact TfL anyway to settle this as I know they will try to fine me one way or another if I don't let them know... 

Cheers!