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Can you drive a car for MOT without insurance?


Mean Green

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Title says it all really, can you legally drive a car to MOT station and back without insurance?

I have a Discovery that I have had in storage and therefore has no insurance - I am considering putting it back on the road and the easiest thing I can think to do is get it MOT'd and then decide if it is worth doing the work.

So that leads to the question above...

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No you can't. All vehicles on the road for any purpose must be insured.

The only thing driving to an MOT station (for a pre booked test) exempts you from is the need to have an MOT or road tax. The reason they allow you not to have tax is because you wouldnt be able to tax it without the MOT certificate.

You could always insure it for a day using one of the internet based one day insurers. They charge around £30 for a day

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Just to see how things are in other countries...

Here in Spain a vehicle can be:

Abled: car beeing used in public roads.

Temporaly disabled: car beeing out of public roads for a time by owners desire

Definitively disabled: car that has ended it´s working life and it´s going to be destroyed/recycled/breaked for parts. Owmer cannot obtain a definitively disabled certificate. Only registered breakers can do that.

Insurance...all abled cars MUST be insured. An stored car should be "temporaly disabled" or otherwise insurance will be compulsory, even if the car passes a full year not moving an inch in a yard or barn.

Temporaly disabled cars need a MoT for beeing abled again, and should be trailered to the MoT station and back to home again until insurance is obtained.

In Spain is the car itself what you insure, independent of who drives it (restrictions may apply to L drivers). I heard that in UK is the driver itself who is insured, so, if you whant to sell your car and I go for a test drive, it will be a non-insured car . Is that true?

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.....

In Spain is the car itself what you insure, independent of who drives it (restrictions may apply to L drivers). I heard that in UK is the driver itself who is insured, so, if you whant to sell your car and I go for a test drive, it will be a non-insured car . Is that true?

Yes, in the UK it is normally the driver that is insured and if you were to test drive a car you would normally need your own insurance.

How do the insurance companies differentiate between different drivers abilities in Spain? e.g if I was a useless driver that crashed a lot surely my insurance should cost more.

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Do not take it on the road at all without insurance. Suppose a truck hit you and wrote the Landy off? You have lost every penny you have ever invested in it. Or you injure somebody? You could be personally sued for every penny you had. Not good!

Insure first, then pre book an MoT. You are then legally allowed to take the Landy directly to the appointment, then if it fails, directly home or directly to another place where remedial work will be done.

Another thought, if you get picked up by one of those mobile camera vans and the DVLA computer shows the vehicle is not insured, you will be hammered in court.

Cheers,

Bob.

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In Spain all insurance companies share their files, so they know how good driver you are.

You wil be asked for main driver´s name and other possible drivers.

Just to see the diference: we bought a Lancia Phedra MPV and left our old Fiat Punto for my sister-in-law´s use. Adding her as occasional driver (she was then 18 and just 15 days old driving license) made a years insurance bill to raise from 400€ to 700€.

Depending on insurance company, discounts will be applied if you are older than 25/27, have more than two years old driving license and have had no crashes in past 3/5 years.

¿How much per year in UK for insurance?

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If you search on here for some of the insurance topics you will see people with quotes of as little as 100 pounds up to many thousands of pounds. As Western says it depends on many things but there is also a fairly wide variation between the insurance companies. Young drivers often end up having to pay far more than your example.

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Same here. Our Phedra is paying nearly 600€ with same driver as Punto.

The younger you are, more you pay. Are you a woman? Pay less. Married? Pay less, ando so on. Red, yellow and other "sport" or "passionate" colors also pay more.

Years ago a friend with 18 and fresh license was asked 4300€ for a years insurance on a Renault 19 16V wich price (second hand) was 4000€.

With an age of 18 (minimun in Spain for car driving license) is nearly impossible to have an insurance as main driver. Most insurance companies won´t even give you a quote. Just don´t want you as customer.

I remeber a BBC Top Gear challenge about low cost car+insurance for teens.

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As pete suggested, ask the garage to pick it up. They will either have traders insurance, or a trailer.

On the other hand you may have a friend who has any-car insurance who could drive it. (you can't do that yourself as the policy usually states 'any car not owned by the insured').

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