Car tax query

[7heGeneral]

Hi all,

Got a question relating to the tax situation with my new car.

I just purchased a new car- got it sitting outside on the drive at the minute. I went to tax it, but the theiving ***** want me to pay from the beginning of April. How is this acceptable? The tax authority must be making a killing with all the double payments daily considering how many cars are bought/sold.

Is there a way I can pay from today to get my moneys worth? Or am I best to just wait until 01/05?

Also, it's a 2018 model & has the additional £500 charge applicable until September next year. If I tax it today, that is ~18 months of it being applicable for the charge. does that mean next year I'll pay ~£250? or am I going to be paying another £500?

Thanks in advance!

[Easternlight]

Only way to not lose out is to wait until the 1sct.
It's always been full months only same when you serrender.
Yes it's a con and yes they do very nicely out of it
The extra is payable up to and including year five.

[LuS1fer]

DVLA are thieves.
You sell a car on 5th April, they refund you from May.
The new buyer pays from the beginning of April.

Bring back the honest old days when you sold the tax with the car.

I have a Mustang I tax for 6 months. There is a show on the 30th April. To take it to the show I would have to tax it from 1st April.

[Sheepshanks]

7heGeneral said:

I just purchased a new car

it's a 2018 model

Anyway, if you leave it until 1st May you'lll get a penalty, plus the duty for April, for having an untaxed car for a few days.

Think of the double charge for April as an admin fee.

[TonyRPH]

Even in the days when tax was transferred with the car, it wasn't possible to buy a part month's tax.

You always had to pay for a full month, even if taxing it 5 days before month end.

It is a dumb system, especially in these days of pay as you go.

But it is what it is!

[Ankh87]

If you want to wait then SORN the car otherwise just pay the tax.

Everyone knows tax is a scam in the first place and just extra money the Government can take from you.

[sixor8]

If you don't want to pay the 'luxury' tax don't buy the car. The rules about VED have been around for many years. I always SORN a car if I buy one with less than a week to go in the month. One of my cars was only £30 so I didn't mind.

They had to change the system when they got rid of the paper discs, I suppose.

[SturdyHSV]

If you SORN it, you also can't then tax it online within about 5 days I think it is (it tells you when you make the SORN) and would have to go to the post office instead if you did want to then tax it at the start of May. Extra convenient

[Sheepshanks]

TonyRPH said:

Even in the days when tax was transferred with the car, it wasn't possible to buy a part month's tax.

You always had to pay for a full month, even if taxing it 5 days before month end.

It is a dumb system, especially in these days of pay as you go.

But it is what it is!

If the car is brand new (which is kind of why I was having a dig at the op for saying "new car") then it can be taxed for an extra few days if it's registered towards the end of a month. I had it a couple of times on company cars.

I wondered it it might have stopped now, but one of the car salesmen on here said it's still done.

[jonwm]

It benefitted me last month, i taxed my new car on the 28th March at the £265 rate rather than £290 from 1st April.

Swings in roundabouts I suppose as the guy who chopped it in paid for March too.

[SteveR1979]

Really?

Have you been living under a rock?

[samoht]

7heGeneral said:

Also, it's a 2018 model & has the additional £500 charge applicable until September next year. If I tax it today, that is ~18 months of it being applicable for the charge. does that mean next year I'll pay ~£250? or am I going to be paying another £500?

The surcharge is pro-rated. So if it was in fact £250 pa basic rate plus a £500 surcharge with 18 months to run, it would go £750, £500, £250 in successive years, and then £250 pa each year thereafter. To put it another way, in the road tax year in which the surcharge runs out, you pay the proportion of the surcharge according to how far through that 12 month tax period it expires.

[Pica-Pica]

SteveR1979 said:

Really?

Have you been living under a rock?

Indeed. Pistonheads: the forum for people who struggle to manage with life.

[Hol]

TonyRPH said:

Even in the days when tax was transferred with the car, it wasn't possible to buy a part month's tax.

You always had to pay for a full month, even if taxing it 5 days before month end.

It is a dumb system, especially in these days of pay as you go.

But it is what it is!

This^^

it’s ALWAYS been this way. You have never been able to pay for, or receive a refund for part of a month.

[cossy400]

Yea same boat here £560 last Sunday for our new car.

Robbing fkers

[DiscoSINGH]

Do you have a logbook for the car? That will also tell you how long you need to keep paying the additional luxury tax for.

[MitchT]

I was checking out the particulars of a used BMW 440i recently - pushing £50k new as specced so additional rate applied. I was under the impression that the additional rate applies until a car is six years old, however, according to the government's official online checker the additional rate applies until 30 April 2024, which is 5.5 years after it was first registered on 31 October 2018. What's that about?

[MustangGT]

MitchT said:

I was checking out the particulars of a used BMW 440i recently - pushing £50k new as specced so additional rate applied. I was under the impression that the additional rate applies until a car is six years old, however, according to the government's official online checker the additional rate applies until 30 April 2024, which is 5.5 years after it was first registered on 31 October 2018. What's that about?

The DVLA states:

Vehicles with a list price of more than £40,000

You have to pay an extra £390 a year if you have a car or motorhome with a ‘list price’ (the published price before any discounts) of more than £40,000. You do not have to pay this if you have a zero emission vehicle.

You only have to pay this rate for 5 years (from the second time the vehicle is taxed).

So, the first year is CO2 based then from the second time of taxing the car you pay for the next five years. This applies if the first year is cancelled part way through, e.g. change of ownership.

[glennjamin]

DVLA are nothing more than bunch of robbing bds. Stopped tax discs which resulted in millions of lost revenue.. They then drempt up idea to pay hundreds more tax just for the privilege of owning a expensive car. Better they keep the tax disc system.Clown operation! Motorists being hammered as usual.

[MitchT]

MustangGT said:

You only have to pay this rate for 5 years (from the second time the vehicle is taxed).

So, the first year is CO2 based then from the second time of taxing the car you pay for the next five years. This applies if the first year is cancelled part way through, e.g. change of ownership.

So, if the car changed hands at six months old, the additional rate would apply until it was 5.5 years old instead of six years old? That would explain the additional rate ending early, though this car's first owner had it for 10 months and 21 days, so it still doesn't explain the additional rate ending six months before its sixth "birthday" when, by the above logic, it should probably have ended just one month before.