Reg Plates And SORN Road Tax For Vehicles

Reg Plates Article

Reg Plates And SORN Road Tax For Vehicles

All cars registered in the UK have to be taxed annually. Not renewing car tax is a criminal offence, and is picked up very quickly by the police. If you plan to have your car off the road for an extended period of time, you need to apply for something called a Statutory Off Road Notice (SORN) to avoid being liable for tax during that time.

You could be fined up to £2,500 if you drive a car that’s subject to a SORN on the road. One exception to this rule is allowed: if you can prove you’re driving your car to its MoT test.

It makes no difference if your car spends all its time parked up on your drive; it still needs be taxed. If you don’t want to tax it and you’re not going to use it for a while, your only option is to apply to the DVLA for a SORN.

Having one of these means you don’t have to tax your car, as long as you keep it off the road. It could save you a lot of money if you don’t plan to drive your car for a long period of time, like if you’re travelling abroad for more than a month or if it’s not roadworthy for whatever reason. But as soon as the vehicle even touches a road, you’ll need to pay tax, as driving it would overturn the SORN.

What do I need to do to SORN a vehicle?

If you’re absolutely sure you won’t use the vehicle, it’s easy to do by going to www.gov.uk/make-a-sorn, calling the DVLA on 0300 123 4321 or by posting a completed V90 form to its HQ in Swansea.

The 11-digit reference number from your car’s V5C (logbook) or 16-digit reference number from a road-tax renewal letter will be necessary here. Your car’s registration number, make and model will also be required. Enter the date you wish the SORN to begin as well. The DVLA will refund you any unused road tax.

You won’t need to renew the SORN each year. Instead, it’ll lapse when you notify the DVLA you wish to start paying road tax on it again, or it has a change of owner (you might sell it).

Because a SORN cannot be transferred from one owner to another, if you buy a car that’s the subject of a SORN, you have to apply to the DVLA to have it cancelled. Either way, the DVLA will regard the SORN as having ended with the change of owner and road tax will become due once more.

As long as they adhere to a few special conditions, vehicle testers and motor traders don’t have to apply for a SORN.

How close a series of letters or numbers are to a real name of word: if the match quality is high (and the numbers and letters are very convincing in making a popular word), the value of the registration plate will be higher. This means that a match like 5IMON, for the name Simon, will be worth a lot more than a more obscure set of letters and numbers that are not as convincing a match, such as S17 MMM for the name Sam.

The style of the plate: this means establishing if it is a new-style plate, an older-style format or if it is dateless or Irish, for instance. Other options are that it is a prefix-style plate or a suffix-style plate. New-style number plates, which have been produced since 2001, tend to be the least valuable because they are a bit less appealing to some collectors, plus the rule about not having plates that are newer than your car can also come into play, putting people off from buying a newer-style plate for their older car. Prefix-style number plates, which were in production between 1983 and 2001 can be more popular as more vehicles are entitled to have those licence numbers, and they may have fewer characters in total. Suffix-style plates, issued from 1963 to 1983 are relatively rare, which means they can attract higher prices than prefix-style plates and newer designs. Dateless number plates, also known as cherished number plates, were produced between 1903 and 1963 and are nearly always the most valuable number plate configurations; they have fewer digits and their dateless nature means that people can hide the age of their car. Irish number plates are similar to dateless number plates, especially because they don’t have a year identifier. They also tend to be cheaper than other types of vehicle registration plates.

number plates reg transfers