euro car importing - kinda?

[Nano2nd]

i've just had a thought and wondered if its complete cack?

my father has just purchased a property in southern spain and hes talking about buying a cheap runabout and leaving it there for when he goes over.. which got me thinking(lol doesn't happen very often)

whats to stop him ordering a new car in RHD registering/insuring etc it over there and bringing it back over here and using it full time? the advantages i see are cheap euro car(which we all know) if he's payed local tax he wouldn't have to pay UK VAT surely?
no UK road tax? and spainish plates means he could run every speed camera in the UK lol - okay so maybe not the last one

is this feasable or not? or am i missing something?

[agent006]

I think insurance would be a problem. It certainly would be if using a UK car on the continent. I think you get a maximun of about 60 days foreign use. Unless it's differnet in spain.

[agent006]

I think insurance would be a problem. It certainly would be if using a UK car on the continent. I think you get a maximun of about 60 days foreign use. Unless it's differnet in spain.

[Nano2nd]

hmm.. not sure about that will have to do some research? how do the armed forces get on insuring our vehicles over there long term?

is it possible to insurance a spainish vehicle on a UK based policy?

[marki]

A mate of mine did this with a new range Rover , and no prob`s at all

[danhay]

I think the best way forward is to make the car as legit as possible in Spain - i.e. reigstered, taxed, insured etc. Then if you get stopped or are involved in an accident in the UK anyone would have a very hard time proving you weren't just visiting.

Not sure how much cheaper this would be than legitamising the car in the UK, but you wouldn't have to worry so much about speed camera's. Though if you were to get stopped in person you could still get points as it's based on your licence, not the car.

When I was importing a car from Italy, I was told that insurers won't insure cars registered in another country as it's against some Euro Law? However, my insurance company agreed to insure the car I was importing based on it's chassis number.

Hope some or all of this helps

[willdew]

We imported 4 Shoguns in to the UK from the Emirates about 14 years ago. It was before any models were launched in the UK and they were badged as Parjeros. We used one in the UK for about 6 months on arabic plates and no one ever stopped us. I'm sure it was illegal, but no police man we came across fancied trying to write down our number plate with its swirly arabic letters!!

I'm sure they'd be much more willing to take on a spanish plate though.

[rthierry]

Dual residency is a fact for many people and some insurance companies provide cover in both countries of residence regardless of how much time you spend in the said countries.
Me? I am driving a car that is bought, registered and insured in France. The insurance is valid in the UK as well. As it happen I live mostly in the UK, but the vast majority of my mileage is done in France and I do spend more than 6 weeks a year in France.
Benefits: saved £5k on the purchase of the car and £1k on the insurance.

[Nano2nd]

thanks everyone - very usefull

i found these to articles which seem to comfirm everything >

Current EU legislation states - It is against EU regulations for a United Kingdom insurer to provide cover for vehicles in another member state unless the company is specifically registered to operate on a freedom of services basis in that state and subscribes to the relevant Motor Insurers Bureau of that territory.

The majority of UK Insurers do not meet this requirement at the moment and as a result they are unable to offer cover.

and

A British driver who owns a property in France has purchased a French car.He now wants to bring it back to the UK for a temporary period of up to 1 year; does he have to re-register it in the UK?

DVLA say no, not for up to 1 year for a temporary import.

However Insurance companies are unwilling to give cover for over 30 days to any vehicle that is not being registered in the UK. So the client will either have to obtain extended foreign use cover for the UK under his French policy or re-register the car within 30 days in the UK to obtain UK Insurance.

however as rthierry has stated if you can find a european company that is willing to insure for the UK then sorted

rthierry, do you have a french or UK license? or indeed both?

[JohnL]

Any European insurance policy has to also include cover for use in another EU (plus a few - it's a seperate agreement from the EU and includes Switzerland among others) country.

This is only for the minimum legal cover in the country visited though (usually, including the UK, third party only) so this may not be much use if it'll be a new car unless he's willing to carry the fire/theft/comprehensive risk himself.