Garry Edwards
Moderator
- Messages
- 13,475
- Name
- Garry Edwards
- Edit My Images
- No
So, we have a small farm, and there is a public highway separating the two parts of it, which is pretty normal. It looks more like a farm track than a public highway but it is, which means that all vehicles travelling between the two parts need to have a qualified driver, need to be registered, taxed and insured.
A scheme exists to cover this common situation, a limited form of agricultural registration that restricts mileage, with free VED, no need for an MOT and relaxed rules on lights, indicators etc.
We also have a quad bike, during the summer months we can drive one of our normal off road cars into the fields, delivering water and carrying out the normal twice daily welfare checks etc, but in the winter only the quad bike can cope with the boggy conditions, both without getting hopelessly stuck and without damaging the land. Right now, my Mitsubishi can only manage when it’s very dry, and the Land Rover can’t manage at all, so our choices are limited.
We bought the quad from the previous owner of the farm, it has never been registered and all that I want to do is to register it, so that we can drive it legally.
The DVLA say that we can’t register it with an age related plate because we can’t produce sufficient evidence of the year of manufacturer (the VIN plate isn’t good enough for them) and we can’t get the required evidence from the original dealer, who is no longer in business. But, in theory at least, we CAN register it on a Q plate, which is fine.
They rejected my first 3 applications because HMRC, whose job it is to collect import duties and VAT, need to clear it for registration. Fair enough. After a lot of time wasted on correspondence DVLA told me to register it with HMRC, and after jumping through a few hoops this was done online, back in July. The bike was manufactured in 1995 and HMRC seem to be happy that there is no tax to pay, so back to DVLA, who rejected it again, allegedly because I hadn’t contacted HMRC …
So, another very long phone call to DVLA – very helpful, polite person as always – who told me that HMRC don’t actually contact them or do anything, other than record my contact on their database. What I needed to do was to re-submit to DVLA, quoting the HMRC reference Number, and that I would then get the registration through in 2 weeks.
So I did that, complete with a covering letter of course, which referred to my latest phone conversation.
And today, they have rejected it again, for the 5th time, allegedly because I hadn’t done the necessary with HMRC…
I’ve had enough. This has been going on since April, all because it seems to be easier for DVLA to ignore the clear, carefully written information in front of them than to actually do their job!
The obvious way forward would seem to be to waste further time and actually visit my nearest DVLA office and insist that they dealt with it, in front of me but no, all of their offices have been closed down.
Why am I even bothering to try to work within the law? Simple. We have an extremely annoying neighbour who has too much time on her hands, she videos us (and everyone else in the area) and pressurises the police and all of the other statutory agencies. The police have better things to do with their time but have told us to get it sorted as, technically at least, she is right.
Meanwhile, we have to carry on as before. We have to do it ourselves too because we can’t ask our staff to take the risk.
A scheme exists to cover this common situation, a limited form of agricultural registration that restricts mileage, with free VED, no need for an MOT and relaxed rules on lights, indicators etc.
We also have a quad bike, during the summer months we can drive one of our normal off road cars into the fields, delivering water and carrying out the normal twice daily welfare checks etc, but in the winter only the quad bike can cope with the boggy conditions, both without getting hopelessly stuck and without damaging the land. Right now, my Mitsubishi can only manage when it’s very dry, and the Land Rover can’t manage at all, so our choices are limited.
We bought the quad from the previous owner of the farm, it has never been registered and all that I want to do is to register it, so that we can drive it legally.
The DVLA say that we can’t register it with an age related plate because we can’t produce sufficient evidence of the year of manufacturer (the VIN plate isn’t good enough for them) and we can’t get the required evidence from the original dealer, who is no longer in business. But, in theory at least, we CAN register it on a Q plate, which is fine.
They rejected my first 3 applications because HMRC, whose job it is to collect import duties and VAT, need to clear it for registration. Fair enough. After a lot of time wasted on correspondence DVLA told me to register it with HMRC, and after jumping through a few hoops this was done online, back in July. The bike was manufactured in 1995 and HMRC seem to be happy that there is no tax to pay, so back to DVLA, who rejected it again, allegedly because I hadn’t contacted HMRC …
So, another very long phone call to DVLA – very helpful, polite person as always – who told me that HMRC don’t actually contact them or do anything, other than record my contact on their database. What I needed to do was to re-submit to DVLA, quoting the HMRC reference Number, and that I would then get the registration through in 2 weeks.
So I did that, complete with a covering letter of course, which referred to my latest phone conversation.
And today, they have rejected it again, for the 5th time, allegedly because I hadn’t done the necessary with HMRC…
I’ve had enough. This has been going on since April, all because it seems to be easier for DVLA to ignore the clear, carefully written information in front of them than to actually do their job!
The obvious way forward would seem to be to waste further time and actually visit my nearest DVLA office and insist that they dealt with it, in front of me but no, all of their offices have been closed down.
Why am I even bothering to try to work within the law? Simple. We have an extremely annoying neighbour who has too much time on her hands, she videos us (and everyone else in the area) and pressurises the police and all of the other statutory agencies. The police have better things to do with their time but have told us to get it sorted as, technically at least, she is right.
Meanwhile, we have to carry on as before. We have to do it ourselves too because we can’t ask our staff to take the risk.
