'Tax Discs - the End of the Road'

[Flinders]

May be worth a mention here- an older relative has stopped driving. His wife (still driving) got a cheque through the post from the DVLA, and only when she rang them to find out what it was for did she realise that the tax disc for their car had been cancelled by the DVLA as soon as they were notified he was giving up his licence.

In Ye Olde Days when we had proper paper discs, the car would have kept the disc until the end of its term. Under this stupid new system, she could easily have driven the car untaxed without realising it - which would have meant she was also uninsured. She had to walk down to the Post Office to sort it out- and it was lucky for her she had one close, many elderly people would have had a problem getting to one as so many have closed.

The money spinner here for the government is they only refund full months, but charge you for full months, so they will normally make an extra month's tax out of it. The downside is that a lot of people will not realise they are driving untaxed (and therefore uninsured?) until they get the cheque and query it.

The new system is in so many ways a load of rubbish, and not only hasn't saved money, it has lost a lot, as there are now far more untaxed vehicles (intentionally and not) than before, despite us being told it would save money and cut down on untaxed vehicles. Yet another failed IT project, where people wanted to keep the old paper system as it was a constant reminder of the due date, said it was better which was obvious, were proved right, but the government pressed ahead and did it regardless. One wonders who got the brown envelopes, and/or which MPs have shares/stakes in the companies who did the IT.

[NUKe]

The car would still be insured assuming the lady in question had valid insurance. Tax is not a requirement of insurance. Although the tax people will not tax a vehicle without insurance.

[Cyril Haearn]

Time to quietly end VED and up the tax on fuel

People will hardly notice as long as they are distracted by the Fairytale Wedding and b*****t

[thirdcrank]

May be worth a mention here- an older relative has stopped driving. His wife (still driving) got a cheque through the post from the DVLA, and only when she rang them to find out what it was for did she realise that the tax disc for their car had been cancelled by the DVLA as soon as they were notified he was giving up his licence. ...

Perhaps there is more to it than that.

Even though it's all done by the DVLA, I'd always assumed that there was no direct connection between the driving licence and vehicle licence systems. The first is based on the individual's driver number and the other on the vehicle's reg. AFAIK, if two people with the same name lived at the same address and one surrendered their driving licence, the DVLA would have no waqy of knowing which was the registered keeper of a vehicle registered in their "same name." Apart from that, even if a driving licence is surrendered, I'm pretty sure you only get a refund of car tax once they've received written notification that the car has been disposed of or a SORN declaration is completed. I suspect that there's been some mix up/ confusion, over which paperwork has been completed. The big change here is that the tax cannot be sold on with the car. That's nothing to do with the scrapping of the tax discs, although it may have been introduced at the same time. Bearing in mind that new cars are generally (always?) registered and taxed by the vendor, there's no check at that stage of whether the purchaser holds a driving licence and it's not a condition of buying a car. I have two forenames and they have not always been on the registration docs of cars registered in my name.

[Flinders]

AFAIK there was no mix up. The DVLA returned the remaining part of the tax and terminated the virtual tax disc, and the lady in question hadn't asked them to do this.
I suggest people are very careful in similar circumstances to check that the vehicle continues to be taxed.

[RickH]

AFAIK there was no mix up. The DVLA returned the remaining part of the tax and terminated the virtual tax disc, and the lady in question hadn't asked them to do this.
I suggest people are very careful in similar circumstances to check that the vehicle continues to be taxed.

I suspect a box has been ticked that shouldn't have been (or vice versa). I would doubt it is completely automatic otherwise there are too many scenarios where things could go wrong - parent in a granny flat gives up licence & family finds their car is no longer taxed is one that springs to mind.

[Flinders]

AFAIK there was no mix up. The DVLA returned the remaining part of the tax and terminated the virtual tax disc, and the lady in question hadn't asked them to do this.
I suggest people are very careful in similar circumstances to check that the vehicle continues to be taxed.

I suspect a box has been ticked that shouldn't have been (or vice versa). I would doubt it is completely automatic otherwise there are too many scenarios where things could go wrong - parent in a granny flat gives up licence & family finds their car is no longer taxed is one that springs to mind.

A form where it is so easy to miss something important is a badly designed form.
The simple fact is that under the old scheme there would have been no problem.