There have been many complaints that the new UK vehicle tax system is providing the government with extra revenue because when a vehicle is purchased the new owner is no longer allowed to benefit if there is any period of tax left to run before it expires.
The new UK vehicle tax system came into force on 1st October 2014; the new rules meant that although drivers still had to tax their vehicles, drivers were no longer legally required to display a valid tax disc on their vehicle. The AA and RAC have both voiced misgivings about the new system, the RAC is reported to have suggested that the number of motorists failing to purchase vehicle tax could actually reach the same high figures of those people who are driving around without purchasing vehicle insurance, they feel that the new vehicle tax system will result in a loss of £167 million a year due to vehicle tax evasion. The Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) have called this nonsense and said there is “no basis” to the figures supplied by the RAC. President of the AA, Edmund King said that potentially there could be “issues for our patrols towing a vehicle which they will not know immediately if it is taxed. Likewise if a vehicle appears to have been dumped on the roadside the lack of a valid tax disc is often an indication that this is the case.” The AA are also concerned about the extra revenue they believe this new vehicle tax system will generate for the government, Edmund King said “Someone driving a car that costs £500 a year to tax would lose £41 if they sold it at the beginning of the month”, he continued “Likewise a buyer purchasing a car mid month would have to pay Vehicle Excise Duty for the entire month”, this would mean of course that in many instances when a vehicle has changed ownership both the seller of that vehicle and the purchaser will have paid vehicle excise duty (car tax) for the month in which the sale took place.
The DVLA said that the abolition of the paper tax disc means £10 million a year could be saved and that the new vehicle tax system would not result in a great deal of additional revenue for the government as a refund for car tax could only ever be claimed for each whole month of remaining unused tax, refunds for part of a month were never allowed.
Special Thanks Gareth Milner for providing the image
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The new car tax rules came into force on 1 October 2014 but it seems that the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) online system was unable to cope, leaving thousands of their customers unable to renew their car tax.
The DVLA said that their website had seen “an unprecedented volume of traffic”, the result of which saw some frustrated customers spending up to thirteen hours trying to renew their vehicle tax online. Considering that the new system was just about to start one would have expected the DVLA to have anticipated an increase in the volume of traffic to their website, however it seems they did not, as a statement from a DVLA spokesman suggests “More than 270,000 people successfully used our online car tax service yesterday – that’s 30,000 more than on the same day last year. We are currently experiencing unprecedented demand which means that some customers may be experiencing slow response times or having difficulty accessing the service” the spokesman added “We are of course very sorry for any inconvenience and we are urgently investigating to improve service quality for the minority of our customers that are experiencing issues”. Problems experienced by users varied from not being able to access the website at all to finding that the site just crashed again and again during the process of renewing their vehicle tax, annoyingly for some customers the phone system at the DVLA also appeared to be suffering with similar problems as callers were left hanging on or their call was just left unanswered. The DVLA suggested that anyone experiencing problems with their online or telephone car tax renewal systems should visit their local post office if they needed to urgently renew their vehicle tax.
The DVLA kept their customers updated via Twitter, apologising and explaining that they were suffering problems with their website.
“We are currently experiencing high volumes of traffic to our online car tax service, please try later. Sorry for the inconvenience”
“We’re urgently investigating why some of you are having problems using our online car tax service tonight. Sorry for any inconvenience”
“Our online car tax system is working. Sorry if you are having difficulties but please keep trying”
“Unprecedented demand tonight. We built to scale but 6000 a minute is causing slow response. Around 250K have taxed tonight so keep trying”
It is not known whether anyone caught without tax whilst on their way to the post office to tax their vehicle, as advised by the DVLA, will have their fine waived due to the circumstances.
Special Thanks Phil Long for providing the image.
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Motorists in the UK will not be required to display a paper tax disc in their vehicle from 1st October 2014, amusingly the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency (DVLA) has run out of its own supply of specially perforated tax disc paper a little early and has been forced to resort to printing tax discs on ordinary printer paper with ordinary printers! The DVLA said “DVLA is running down its pre-existing stock to ensure there is no wastage. To give value for money to the tax payer we have not replenished our stock for this short period but decided to print these discs in-house until October 1”. If you have taxed your vehicle online you will receive a sheet of printer paper upon which your tax disc will be printed, there will be no perforations and you will be required to cut the disc out yourself before displaying it on your windscreen, the DVLA statement also said “The paper used to print your tax disc is different to that used previously and there are no perforations”. If you buy your tax at your local post office you will probably receive the old style, perforated tax disc as the post office supplies have not yet been depleted.
Although the start of October is fast approaching it is quite surprising to hear that almost a third of drivers in the UK have no idea about the changes that are soon to be introduced, this with only a few days left before we reach the end of September! The President of the Automobile Association (AA), Edmund King, said “Abolition of the disc has a big impact on those changing their cars post October 1st and drivers need to know the rules. We have shared our concern with DVLA so hopefully they can ensure more information is put out.” The DVLA said “We have told the police and other enforcement authorities that we have issued these discs however the paper disc is no longer relied upon to check if a vehicle is taxed or not.” This could well turn out to be an issue for some drivers with some motoring experts predicting that many confused motorists will be facing fines for unwittingly failing to follow the new rules.
We wonder how many fake tax discs will be displayed upon windscreens before the 1st of October, the printed versions sent out by the DVLA will be so easy to change by anyone with a scanner and a basic knowledge of using a computer. The experts agree with us, President of the AA, Edmund King, said “It is ironic that after years of trying to deter bogus or fake tax discs such as those made out of Guinness labels or photo-copies, the DVLA now have to produce their own ‘fake’ discs as they have run out.”
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After breaching the limits for air pollution Britain is to be penalised by the European Commission and diesel vehicles are being blamed for the problem, now Britain is under more pressure from the EU to reduce the levels of pollution in our cities. As a direct result of this pressure the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, has revealed plans for an additional £10 fee for motorists who wish to drive a diesel vehicle in London, a move being watched with interest by several other major cities around the country who may implement their own extra charges for diesel vehicles.
The Government has been encouraging drivers to buy diesel for more than ten years, giving incentives such as tax breaks, citing the fuel efficiency of diesel vehicles and the lower levels of carbon dioxide produced. The use of diesel vehicles soared and a third of all vehicles on our roads are now diesel, an increase in numbers from 1.6 million to over 11 million. Drivers who thought they were doing the right thing in buying a diesel vehicle as they give off less carbon dioxide are now discovering that they actually contribute to thousands of premature deaths every year because of the high levels of nitrogen dioxide and fine particles produced by diesels! British motorists are still not being given all the information they need when buying a new car, Chairman of the committee on air pollution for the Department of Health, Frank Kelly said “I have full sympathy with the public who have not been provided balanced information on this issue.” Adding “Even today if you go to buy a new car you are provided with lots of information about its CO2 emissions and nothing in respect to the pollutants it emits.” Resentment is likely to be high as British motorists are, once again, slapped with another charge for using their cars. President of the AA, Edmund King, spoke recently to The Telegraph and he said “Some drivers will feel betrayed and misled because they were encouraged to go for the dash for diesel.” adding “In the 1990s there was a near hysteria about carbon dioxide, and yet nobody looked at the bigger picture.” Mr King also said “The drivers thought they were doing the right thing, but now they are being told that it has serious health implications. They are being made to feel guilty for something that they were encouraged to do.” Now it seems that road taxes for diesel vehicles may be increased to the same rate as petrol vehicles, motoring groups are warning against such a move, with Edmund King saying “There is no doubt that other cities, encouraged by EU legislation, will look to introduce similar restrictions on diesel cars.” He added “I think it’s highly likely that the Treasury might slap extra penalties on diesel vehicles.”
So does this mean that the value of your diesel car is about to drop through the floor? Director of the RAC Foundation, Professor Stephen Glaister, said: “Buying a car is one of the biggest purchases people make.” He added “Drivers do not want to go to the garage one morning only to find what was previously worth a lot of money has plummeted in value overnight because politicians have suddenly moved the goalposts. People with the oldest, dirtiest diesels will feel the financial squeeze most. They face paying more to use their cars and getting less for them when they try to sell.”
At the moment the Government says it has no plans to increase fuel duty for diesel vehicles.
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After 93 years the tax disc is to be scrapped and replaced with an electronic system, Chancellor George Osborne has announced in the Autumn Statement.
First introduced in 1921, the tax disc displayed proof that the motorist had paid the vehicle excise duty. Vehicle taxation was actually introduced in the 1888 budget, although vehicle excise duty applying specifically to motor vehicles came into being with the Roads Act of 1920 with the tax disc arriving a year later.
The new electronic system will enable people to pay VED by monthly direct debit, which will be much more convenient and will help cash strapped motorists to budget by spreading the cost, it will also mean Treasury savings of £7m in administration costs. The police and DVLA mostly rely on the electronic register so the present tax disc system is no longer necessary, a Treasury spokesperson said it would make “dealing with government more hassle free” and that it showed the government was moving “into the modern age”. It will still be possible to tax a vehicle at a post office or by telephone.
The changes are due to come into force in October 2014.
Special Thanks comedy_nose for providing the image
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