Importation and the DVLA

[Peter1963]

Well, I've enjoyed receiving advice from a number of you over the last month or so, so maybe time for me to share an experience that may help others. Or I may just be venting my frustration....
Having imported my 1963 FHC from Durban at the end of April, it languished with a certain shipping company for around 5 weeks- difficulty obtaining a lower steering column yoke to fix (I now suspect) the wrong problem. Still at least it finally got an MOT. If anyone wants to chat re shipping companies then feel free to PM me. Not all plain sailing if you'll forgive the pun.
Eventually had the car delivered to me 2 weeks ago today - the shipping company having submitted the paperwork to our friends in Swansea to get it registered. They may want to inspect it I was told.... I receive an email telling me that they do indeed want to inspect it. Ugh.
So - first top tip - if you are importing a car be sure to get the heritage certificate ( which of course I did) but also get an inspection report from JDC or whoever to go with it - which of course I was not made aware of and so did not.
I call the DVLA - nice guy on the phone. But I am left completely in the dark as to why they would want to inspect my car - very vague responses to my questions. Does anyone know what they will be looking for?
All is not lost however - with no owners club (or whatever) inspection - they can arrange, at no cost, to have an inspection carried out by a third party. Great says I - let's set a date. Not that simple. They (DVLA) need to send me a letter - a letter! Not an email, no - if must be a letter which will be sent from another department. My heart sinks.
So they had had the application for 10 days and only when I rang them 2 weeks ago did they alert me to the process. Now - 2 weeks later and a chat with a different, still thoroughly pleasant chap, I do not have the letter containing the contact details of the inspection company. A letter!!! Who sends letters these days for anything other than expressions of love?!
Not to worry - they now give me a case number and the phone number for the inspection company.
I call them. They are aware of my car. I'd like to arrange a date I say. Ok - so which dates are you not available, I am asked. I tell them. Ok - we'll bear this in mind when setting the date. Eh? Can't we just set the date now says I? Oh no - it's a complicated process - to set the date - I am told that this process will take 5 or 6 days.
5 or 6 days? To set a date? Really?
So when do I think I might get to drive my car? Who knows - I've given up forecasting a date.
So I might have a date next week at this time for the inspection - heaven only knows their lead time.
They then write a report to the DVLA - presumably on vellum with a quill pen.
The DVLA will consider it and then decide to issue (or, horror of horrors not issue) a V5.
Then I can order plates
Then stick them on the car.
Then drive it.
Best guess? Another 6 weeks. It arrived in the port of London on 28th April......

Final top tip - patience patience patience. And interrogate every little step of the process from the moment you have handed over the cash and watched your car be driven away on a flat bed in a foreign country.
I actually did go for a day trip to Durban, saw it, drove it, bought it and flew home on March 30th.
So - I get it on the road 4 1/2 months later..... but maybe I'm just being impatient.

I am however quite incredulous at the modus operandi of the licensing authority. And how much is this costing the public purse?

Please feel free to send me messages of commiseration / a telling off for being impatient / being unappreciative of due process.
More seriously if anyone reading this would like to know more then please feel free to get in touch.
Here's to the weekend....
Peter

[cactusman]

Commmiserations....hope you get it sorted soon. Others have recounted experiences getting their cars registered and it seems to be a lengthy business. Added to that the DVLA are now much more strict about age and entitlement to free road tax I believe so maybe this too has meant further administatium...

[Hugo]

As far as I'm aware they will just want to check the VIN, which is easy cos you don't have one. I would just make sure that the chassis plate doesn't look like it's just been attached with brand new rivets.
Government agencies work at a glacial pace, and, more to the point, they make everything far more complicated than it needs to be.
The advantage of not having a VIN visible through the windscreen is that you can slap any old foreign plates on there for now & nobody will know the difference. I have some old Florida license plates ready for when my E Type is finally back together. Then they can take as long as they want to issue a British reg. In the meantime I can rack up as many parking tickets & speeding tickets as I like. It will be converted to RHD by then but I don't suppose they'll figure that out.
As you say, it's not plain sailing. It's 'plane sailing' (or not, in your case). It's where you don't have to take the curvature of the Earth into account when plotting a course because it's just a short hop.

[Michaelg]

My experience of the DVLA, and I've dealt with them often in my professional capacity, is that they are polite and helpful. They are obliged by law to check vehicles coming into the UK to be registered for obvious reasons and I'm sure there would be immediate criticism if they didn't do so, particularly on this blog. It's easy to make snide points at their expense, but I think they do a good job.

[mgcjag]

Hi Michael.....i didnt read any "snide comments" just someones exasperation at the long winded drawn out process and inefficiency at the DVLA

[Hugo]

Have you observed that every government agency has notices prominently posted to the effect that they will not tolerate anybody abusing their staff, who are working very hard for your benefit.
I wonder why they need such notices. Commercial business don't need them - they just go out of business if they carry on like the government does.

[Michaelg]

Frankly if I were an underpaid employee of the DVLA dealing with what appears to be someone (who appears to live abroad) being sarcastic about a system which actually isn't complicated at all (I've done it several times) I probably wouldn't go out of my way to be particularly helpful. Moreover I wouldn't want others to get the impression that we think it's a great idea to put fake plates on a car so we can speed as much as we want and avoid the consequences. And I speak as someone with 12 points on my licence (and before anyone asks the Magistrates thought I was a special case and didn't disqualify me).

[Hugo]

Doesn't everybody do that? My runabout car is registered in my wife's name so she gets all the tickets. Ok, she can nominate me as the driver. But even ignoring the fact that this process itself is a gross violation of our ancient constitutional rights (that no man can be required to incriminate himself), I will simply deny all knowledge. That leaves her as the sole prosecution witness, and a wife cannot testify against her husband.
Anyway it sounds like you've got yourself a good lawyer - maybe you can let me have his number?

[Michaelg]

I am a good lawyer!

[Hugo]

I asked for that, didn't I?

[Michaelg]

It's true though that a wife cannot generally be made to give evidence against her husband, but she can do voluntarily, so you'll need to keep her sweet! Chris Huhne MP didn't and both he and his wife Vicky Pryce went to prison for fibbing about who was driving.......

[Hugo]

Ah yes. I'm always amazed at how willing people are to incriminate themselves in this country, whether it be speeding tickets or TV licences or whatever. Apart from going against a fundamental tenet of our constitution, this is also a breach of Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights I believe. As far as I'm concerned, if they're too lazy to police the roads properly, they needn't expect me to help them with their prosecution. They will have to prove it every inch of the way.

[Vonkie]

Hi Peter

I feel for you. Makes my frustrations about delays seem more trifling. I am hoping to be up and running myself before the month is out. Testing being done and retrim probably next week. Nervous about the niggles once custody is mine.

Keep us updated - remember, our cars are from the same litter.

Good luck. I suppose just try to think about other things. That makes the time pass more easily.

[PeterCrespin]

I'm always amazed at how willing people are to incriminate themselves in this country, whether it be speeding tickets or TV licences or whatever.

You mean, like explaining their M. O. for peverting justice on an open public forum and dragging their spouse into it? Nice. Very chivalrous. Did she rush to volunteer for this criminal behaviour?

If you want to see inefficiency and jobsworth bureaucracy writ large, UK would not be one of the top countries I'd choose, they'd be a breath of unbribed fresh air. They'd probably be a lot slicker too, if they could assume everyone was honest and they didn't have to be measured and appear pedantic because of people trying to game the system. 'Festina lente' and all that...?

[Hugo]

That's an interesting observation. But just think about this; There's nothing illegal or criminal about declining to incriminate oneself. It is my absolute constitutional right to refrain from doing so. I am merely requiring the police and prosecution to do their job properly, as any defence lawyer would get paid handsomely for doing.
And I'm certainly not asking my wife to do anything illegal. The State will demand that she tells them who was driving that car at any particular time. That is information she almost certainly will not have. Yet if she does not give them this information she will be VERY heavily fined and have her licence endorsed with lots of points. Do you think that is right? That a citizen may be harshly punished for failing to hand over information that they are under no legal obligation to hold? To my shame, I had to have this point explained to me, because, like most people, including yourself perhaps?, I had just thought it was perfectly normal for the government to behave like this.
Curiously, when it comes to the police themselves, whenever there is an attempted prosecution of an officer for breaking the speed limits, they are never able to identify the driver. Funny, isn't it?
With my commercial vehilces I am indeed under a legal obligation to keep records of who is driving at a particular time, so that is different. But with a private car there is no such obligation.
In my wife's case, I would expect her to just guess, and tell them I was driving. And I will just challenge them to prove it. What is wrong with that?
With Huhne and wotsername it was different. They told a deliberate lie under oath, and for that they were rightly jailed.

[Hugo]

If you want to see inefficiency and jobsworth bureaucracy writ large, UK would not be one of the top countries I'd choose, they'd be a breath of unbribed fresh air. They'd probably be a lot slicker too, if they could assume everyone was honest and they didn't have to be measured and appear pedantic because of people trying to game the system. 'Festina lente' and all that...?

Don't get me started! I deal with the DVSA on a constant basis. I think when I started dealing with them many years ago, 'festina lente' might have been a fair description of how they worked. That was long before they were the DVSA of course. But today they are a very different animal. It is quite literally impossible to book an MoT test for a commercial vehicle with the DVSA. And I do mean literally impossible. They only accept bookings up to 93 days in advance, and they have no available slots within that time frame, not this side of Scotland, anyway. They are selling off the testing stations (paid for with tax-payers' money) and sub-contracting the MoT testing to private garages ('ATFs'), using DVSA staff. Their excuse for doing this is to "Bring testing closer to the customer". But there is now an eleven month waiting list at the ATFs, because they don't have enough staff. The nearest test I can book within the next three months involves a 500 mile round trip. This is their idea of 'closer to the people'. I could write a book about my dealings with them. In fact one day I might just do that, but this is not the place to begin chapter one.

[Michaelg]

I'm sorry Hugo but you're wrong on a number of counts.
Firstly the reason for asking the name of the driver is to avoid prosecuting the wrong person, i.e. To protect the innocent. Secondly your wife almost certainly would know who was driving. What bloke would put his beloved in the position of committing a crime to get himself off the hook? Thirdly Huhne and his wife were not convicted of lying on oath, but conspiring to pervert the course of justice, exactly what you have encouraged. This is treated really seriously by the Courts which most people don't realise. Swapping points if discovered almost always leads to a jail sentence, even for a first offence. I'm only pontificating about this so people don't get the impression from your remarks that it's all a bit of a joke.
I'm not going to say any more about this as this forum is meant to be about our amazing E Types and is the wrong place for this sort of thing.

[Hugo]

I will keep my response brief for obvious reasons, but I cannot let your remarks go un-challenged. Maybe you have mis-understood me? When have I ever said anything about asking my wife to 'commit a crime to get me off the hook''?
It makes not the slightest difference to me whether she nominates me as the driver or tells them it was the Man in the Moon. I would not seek to influence her in any way, let alone ask her to commit a crime on my behalf. Where did you get such a notion? Not from anything I have written, that's for sure.
How would my wife know who is driving the car at any particular time? You seem to think she should? She would in all probability be many miles away from any alleged offence, and have absolutely no knowledge of my movements. It could be anybody at the wheel for all she knows. Are you saying she is required to keep a record of who drives the car and when? The law, as I'm sure you are aware, says no such thing.
When have I ever advocated 'swapping points' with my wife? Again, you will not find any reference to such a practice in anything I have written on here or anywhere else. All I have ever said is that I will deny any offence and invite them to prove it. The fact that they can't prove it, because they have no evidence, is not my problem. Please explain to me how simply denying an offence amounts to perverting the course of justice?
In fact, you plainly don't appreciate the irony of your accusations against me. Consider this; - it is the government who will demand that my wife tells a lie on oath just so they can secure a conviction. If she were to go into the witness box and just tell the truth - simply say "I don't know", she will be punished harshly for it. The government will demand that she invent the 'facts' and present them to the court as evidence under oath. And you accuse ME of perverting the course of justice?
I am genuinely puzzled as to how you can have mis-construed my remarks to such a degree. I try to write in clear language, and yet you are levelling accusations against me that bear no relation to anything I have written. Maybe you're getting me muddled up with Mr Huhne? That would be an even worse calumny
PS I would be glad to continue this debate privately before we get shouted at.

[Herzeg]

Hugo

You might think this is a simplistic way of looking at it but in the UK the driver is insured, not the vehicle. So if your wife let's the "man in the moon" drive your car, he needs to have insurance to protect the rest of us. I would never let any of my cars out of my sight without knowing who is driving them and that they had a licence and insurance to do so.

I just hope I am not driving down roads where your cars are as the vehicle owner probably won't know who's driving them and whether they are legal? Who is getting the points is irrelevant when they hit me head on going too fast, possibly on false plates from Florida.

[Heuer]

This thread is becoming completely off topic. We have someone who is digging a very large hole for himself with the authorities and a lawyer talking about the law whilst admitting he flouts it to the tune of 12. This does none of us any good (and I am most certainly no Saint in this regard, although with no points on my licence) and we do not want to be seen as E-Type hoodlums. Hell, the car got enough bad press back in the day without us adding to it.

Hugo, in particular - if you want to tell apocryphal tales of your (possibly illegal) adventures please do it elsewhere because we are not interested.

Any more posts not relevant to 'Importation and the DVLA' will be deleted. The Forum has a "Ban Hammer" feature which we have never had to use but apparently it removes all traces of a member and their posts. Don't tempt us to try it!