VED:
Classic Vehicle exemption extended
A surprise announcement in the
Budget 2013 document issued by HM Treasury alongside the Chancellor of Exchequer's
Budget statement to the House of Commons on Wednesday 20th March 2013 was the
Government will extend the cut-off date from which classic vehicles are exempt
from VED by one year. From 1st April 2014 a vehicle manufactured before 1st January
1974 will be exempt from paying VED. (Para 2.148, page 84 - see an extract of
this paragraph.
There is some
time (just over 12 months) before this new exemption will begin to apply to classic
cars that fall into this 12 month extension period, so there is time to clarify
the details of the eligibility terms and the process by which a vehicle owner
can apply to the DVLA for what is termed "historic vehicle" status.
See
our report on the Budget 2013. 130320 More
Note
updated: 140114
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What
is the current DVLA procedure for taxing historic vehicles?
Form
INF34 sets out the requirements and process which is set out below. You can download
a copy of INF34 on the www.dft.gov.uk
website
How does DVLA identify a vehicle as 'historic'
From
1st April 2014 you may be able to tax your vehicle in the 'historic vehicle' tax
class if it was built before 1st January 1974 and is one of the qualifying vehicles
listed on DVLA form INF34 which includes Private or Light Goods vehicles (PLG).
Note you will not have to pay vehicle tax (Vehicle Excise Duty or VED) if you
have a historic vehicle, but you must still tax and insure it every year and display
a "nil value" tax disc.
How do you tax your
vehicle in the historic vehicle tax class
The first time you tax
a vehicle in the historic vehicle tax class you must do so by posting the documents
to DVLA Swansea. We await clarification from DVLA of their process for handling
aplications to change vehicle status from PLG to "Historic" and whether
that change of status can be included in an application to obtain a "nil
value" tax disc at a local Post Office. At this stage it is not clear at
all.
DVLA local office closure
The DVLA local offices were closed
in the final three months of 2013 so the previous option of taking your documents
there is no longer available.
The
documents you will need to produce
Vehicle registration certificate (V5C)
- this must clearly show that the vehicle was made or first registered before
1st January 1974. If you do not have a V5C, or if you think the age shown is incorrect,
you will need to produce a dating certificate or evidence from
the vehicle manufacturer. If the V5C indicates that the vehicle was registered
up to and including 7th January 1974, then we expect DVLA will continue their
helpful existing practice and say they will let you register it as an historic
vehicle, based on the assumption that the vehicle would have been made in the
previous year.
> | An
appropriate test certificate (for example, an MOT certificate). | > |
A valid insurance certificate. | > | A
filled in "Application for a tax disc" (V10), which you can get from
www.direct.gv.uk/motoringforms
or Post Office branches that issue tax discs or a DVLA local office. |
Difficulties
with the DVLA records of the year of manufacture
The Federation
of British Historic Vehicle Clubs or FBHVC has mentioned that one of the problems
DVLA has is that the legacy RF60/VE60 logbook did not record the year of manufacture.
Records taken on via normal tax renewals in the 1970s, the year of manufacture
was blank on the database. Records taken on via the V765 scheme always include
a V55/5 form (Taxing and registration of a second had vehicle) so the year of
manufacture is populated for those records. What DVLA has done on their databases
is, if the year of manufacture is missing, they have populated it with the year
it was registered. Fortunately that population of missing year of manufacture
has not affected the RAC database checks system. In the small print on INF34,
(Historic Vehicles), DVLA indicate that if a vehicle was registered up to and
including 7th January, they are prepare to assume that it was manufactured in
the previous year.
If the DVLA are consistent with their policy relating
to pre 1960 vehicles for MOT requirements, they will go down the manufacturer
records/Glass's Guide extract route, and not allow general dating letters. So
we will have to wait and see how the DVLA decides to clarify the procedure for
historic vehicles for the VED tax exemption extension. DVLA have 12 months to
sort things out and clarify their procedures.
However
it's reasonable to assume that that those vehicles registered between 7th January
1973 and 7th January 1974 which are currently taxed as PLG, will automatically
be taxed as an "historic vehicle" from 1st April 2014. There may also
be a crop of vehicles registered after 7th January 1974 where the owner will be
able to claim that it was actually manufactured in 1973. We await clarification
from the FBHVC as to how they understand the DVLA proposes to deal with those
requests for correcting the records held by the DVLA of the year of manufacture.
Will DVLA treat them in the same way as the pre 1960 MOT by only accept extracts
from the manufacturers' records, or an extract from the Glass's Guide, or might
the DVLA be prepared to accept general dating certificates?
Download a
copy of this note above. More
Will
your MGBGTV8 be tax exempt?
See our NEWS item. More
How
can you find out when your MGBGTV8 was built?
The MG Factory Production
Control records for the MGBGTV8 show the key dates during production starting
with "Production Commissioned" and "Mounted on the line",
then "Paint finishing", "Advised for delivery" and finally
"Dispatched from Factory". The date we understand most likely to be
accepted as the "build date" is the "Paint Finishing"
date because by then the car would have left the production line. Using a copy
of those production records we have an online search option on our V8 Grapevine
website where you can order a V8 Factory Records search report which provides
the key dates above for each MGBGTV8 produced at the MG Factory.
V8
Factory records search
Dating
certificate
A Heritage
Certificate from BMIHT at Gaydon is likely the be seen by DVLA as the most authoritative
document evidencing the "built date" for MGBGTV8s. Heritage Certificates
can very easily be obtained from BMIHT online but do note there is a notice on
the BMIHT website saying "there is a potential waiting time of up to 28 days
for Heritage Certificates". Getting
a Heritage certificate
See
our running index of our road tax rules/SORN/motor insurance news items.
More
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