Some say you can remove HPI classifications (cat C/D etc)

[TonyHetherington]

In the Ferrari forum there's a thread discussing a Cat C 355. Looks remarkably good value, having had a few tiles fall on it from a roof. Link here; http://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&a...

Within it, somebody posted a link to this website;

http://www.autoligninspections.co.uk/inspections.h...

Where it clearly says "Any vehicle that passes the inspection will be thoroughly roadworthy and within five working days the vehicle will be removed from the HPI condition alert register".

Now, does that say what I think it says? That with a simple inspection (£265 worth, so it's only going to be a couple of hours) you can get the car to a point where the HPI category is removed and the car appears "original" once again?!

I'm raising it here for the wider audience, rather than diluting the existing thread, but it just completely baffled me that such a simple process could get a car cleared? Or have I read it totally wrong...?

[TonyHetherington]

Ah so essentially it says "the car is not currently Cat C, but once was". So you never lose the fact that it was Cat C (the value of which could be 000s of course).

[TonyHetherington]

GreigM said:

On the other hand - the inspections are VERY thorough - if the price was corrected I'd happily buy and inspected car which was once Cat C - to some extent its had a more thorough inspection of chassis etc than any other used car you'd buy - at least you know it was all done correctly.

Depending on the damage that was caused (i.e. cosmetic versus chassis) £265 worth of inspection doesn't sound very much at all. A few hours tops. That's nowhere near enough time to give a car a (to quote you) "VERY throough" inspection, surely?

[TonyHetherington]

GreigM said:

TonyHetherington said:

Depending on the damage that was caused (i.e. cosmetic versus chassis) £265 worth of inspection doesn't sound very much at all. A few hours tops. That's nowhere near enough time to give a car a (to quote you) "VERY throough" inspection, surely?

Its a couple of hours focused on very specific things - chassis straightness, welding, brakes etc - the important safety stuff....not messing about with "do the electrics work" like a dealer inspection - so for what they do inspect, it is thorough....they just maybe don't inspect as much as some people would expect.

You obviously have experience of it so I will bow to your knowledge - I have none (hence the thread ), but it does surprise me still that something so critical can be done in a few hours.

I take it this isn't in addition to some sort of stringent DVLA test at a local centre (same sort of place where you have the IVA)