worried about customs taking car

danger_mouse_tm

My wife who is a US citizen flies over to the UK and back every week to work. She needs to buy a car to use in the UK but we are worried that if she takes the ferry overto here then the customs will take the car from her as she does not have a fixed address in the UK.

is this true?

testicle

How does she intend to buy and tax a car in the UK with no fixed address?

Top Dog

testicle wrote: »

How does she intend to buy and tax a car in the UK with no fixed address?

And insure it

Alanstrainor

Where exactly do you plan on taxing this car? presuming she has no fixed address in the UK that might not be even possible..
{edit} beaten to it! {edit}

Tipsy Mac

Does she sleep at work in the UK, if not she can use the address where she sleeps.

Mena

Sounds like she is "Normally Tax Resident" in Ireland, which means you'll need to cough up VRT and tax it here. Does she fly over for the whole week or just for a day or so?

Not the standard working arrangement so I'd chat to the revenue people but as mentioned, if she is normally tax resident for Ireland, VRT it is.

jimmycrackcorm

If she has a ferry ticket to show them then she will be ok.

Top Dog

jimmycrackcorm wrote: »

If she has a ferry ticket to show them then she will be ok.

How'd you work that one out? If she has no proof of address in the UK then she can't have proof of tax or insurance. Only other option is that she's importing - or driving with no insurance.

Until OP can answer the questions posted above there's no other answers can be given really.

danger_mouse_tm

On a Sunday evening or Monday morning she will fly into London city and go straight to the office. She stays at freinds that night in London and then take the train to whatever part of england she has to go to in order to give lectures etc. If she cant make it back to london that night she will stay in hotels. We just thought that we could bring the cost of hotels and especially the overpriced rail travel down if she were to get a car. However i gather from other posts that she might have to carry her rent book or a utility bill around if she were to bring the car over here

Drummerboy08

If she has a UK bank a/c, maybe look at leasing a car for a year or two. That way, it wont be in her name, and it can be taxed thru the fleet company. Im not sure what you would do with insurance tho.

Top Dog

Is she getting paid in the UK for her job or is she paid through an Irish base over here?

danger_mouse_tm

danger_mouse_tm wrote: »

She stays at freinds that night in London

Register, Tax and insure the car at her friends house, exchange her license for a UK license and keep a ferry ticket, payslip in the car and you will not have a problem. I would imagine she is entitled to drive it on UK plates anyway as she is in the UK 5 out of the 7 days a week

danger_mouse_tm

Agustin Substantial Cornbread wrote: »

Register, Tax and insure the car at her friends house, exchange her license for a UK license and keep a ferry ticket, payslip in the car and you will not have a problem. I would imagine she is entitled to drive it on UK plates anyway as she is in the UK 5 out of the 7 days a week

Good call Nox, That may be the way to go. We did originally think that it might just be better for her to buy and irish car and bring it over there but that it turn may present insurance problems if there was ever a claim let alone the attention that foreign regestered vehicle would attracted over there from police, couple that with an american licence. I know that she can drive for up to 12 months on her US licence before having to take a test. The contract she is on is only for 9 months and she gets paid by the US company she works for direct into her american account so i dont think the payslips would help much. But she would have hotel/meal receipts in her name ( credit card) and obviously the ferry ticket would be a help. I soppose the real concern is should she leave the car over there somewhere during the three summer months that she is back here and not working.

peasant

long term rental is something I'd investigate.

Ring a few companies and cheekily ask for their options ...you never know, you might strike a deal.

Big Nasty

Hold on a second, are you telling us she's gonna take the ferry over and back in the car every week? Surely that would blow her expenses out of the water!!! If she was leaving the car over there the weekends that's one thing but you did mention bringing it back over here!!!

L1011

MCMLXXV wrote: »

Hold on a second, are you telling us she's gonna take the ferry over and back in the car every week? Surely that would blow her expenses out of the water!!! If she was leaving the car over there the weekends that's one thing but you did mention bringing it back over here!!!

Long term advance booking and with Irish Ferries frequent user discount (20% off IIRC) it wouldn't be THAT overpriced...

Big Nasty

MYOB wrote: »

Long term advance booking and with Irish Ferries frequent user discount (20% off IIRC) it wouldn't be THAT overpriced...

Average return fair is what - €200? That X 48 (i.e: excluding holidays) = €9600 / yr - 20% disc = €7680, excluding tax, insurance, ware and tare and of course petrol driving all year round the UK! Healthy portion gone outta the pay packet there!!!

danger_mouse_tm

No, not everyweekend, just the three months that she is off during the summer and maybe the two weeks at christmas.

Big Nasty

danger_mouse_tm wrote: »

No, not everyweekend, just the three months that she is off during the summer and maybe the two weeks at christmas.

Well that's a little different so! I wouldn't worry about it too much then!

Top Dog

I may be wrong, but I think OP's concerns center around her bringing it back for the 3 month period she has off during the summer (and maybe an occasional weekend where she might need to drive back for some other reason) - not that she'll be taking the ferry weekly.

*edit - too slow typing *

DanGerMus

Just to add something that might interest you you can bring a car over without VRT once it's been registered to you at an address in uk for 6 months and you can proove residense there for same like rent book utility bills etc. She could open a bank acc there to at that address to help. Worth thinking about.

stealthyspeeder

You can get the dealer to pay a years tax for you when you buy the car, they will ask for an address in the UK for the registration document to be sent to so as long as she can recieve mail it should be ok. dunno how the insurance companies would view that sort of thing though!?

stealthyspeeder

stealthyspeeder wrote: »

. dunno how the insurance companies would view that sort of thing though!?

Most insurance company's offer around 90 days foreign cover so thats the three months covered.

OP I wouldnt think twice about bringing the car back for the 3 months. With a UK insurance cert, a ferry ticket booked for returning and any other paper work they wouldnt have a chance of taking the car. Depending on which part of the country you are you might not see guards or customs from one end of the summer to the next.

Also she is not an Irish citizen so she should be entitled to drive the car here for 6 months before the customs would have any right to touch it.

Del2005

danger_mouse_tm wrote: »

Good call Nox, That may be the way to go. We did originally think that it might just be better for her to buy and irish car and bring it over there but that it turn may present insurance problems if there was ever a claim let alone the attention that foreign regestered vehicle would attracted over there from police, couple that with an american licence. I know that she can drive for up to 12 months on her US licence before having to take a test. The contract she is on is only for 9 months and she gets paid by the US company she works for direct into her american account so i dont think the payslips would help much. But she would have hotel/meal receipts in her name ( credit card) and obviously the ferry ticket would be a help. I soppose the real concern is should she leave the car over there somewhere during the three summer months that she is back here and not working.

The issue here is where she's registered for tax. If she's registered in Ireland and is normally resident here then she can't drive a forgien reg vehilce.

I'd look more deeply into her US licence. The Irish don't recognise the US as a valid country for free exchange and I'm nearly certain that the mutual recognition only runs for 12 months from taking up residency. She may be able to work around this by setting up UK residency. But I'd look into this more then worring about getting the car lifted by Irish customs, as she could have the car impounded and crushed in the UK for no licence aswell as a conviction for driving with no licence or insurance.

Del2005

Del2005 wrote: »

The issue here is where she's registered for tax. If she's registered in Ireland and is normally resident here then she can't drive a forgien reg vehilce.

I'd look more deeply into her US licence. The Irish don't recognise the US as a valid country for free exchange and I'm nearly certain that the mutual recognition only runs for 12 months from taking up residency. She may be able to work around this by setting up UK residency. But I'd look into this more then worring about getting the car lifted by Irish customs, as she could have the car impounded and crushed in the UK for no licence aswell as a conviction for driving with no licence or insurance.

If she is being paid directly to her US account and is only in Ireland 2 days a week I dont see how she could be tax resident here. She would be paying the tax in the UK or else in the US. Also I just thought if she has a contract that shows she works in the UK that would go a long way to preventing the customs form touching the car.

You are right about the license it cannot be exchanged for a EU one but it is valid for 12 months so she should be ok for the first year.

MercMad

As del says it all comes down to where she pays her tax, or at least to whom. If at the end of the day she pays tax to the Irish Gov. then it doesn't matter what utility bills, licences or address's she has, she will be considered an Irish resident and therefore cannot legally drive a foreign registered car.

However I think if what you are saying is tru, and she has a US passport, works for a UK company and can show a UK address I doubt she will have any problems if stopped.

DanGerMus

Forgot to mention you need a uk PRSI number to to be able to do that.

ardmacha

She would not be entitled to drive a UK car here. If your marital home is here then she is normally resident here and is just a commuter to Britain.

Her citizenship is not relevant, but it perhaps makes it less likely that they will catch her.

If she was working in the UK the wise thing would have been for her to have imported a car when she got married.

danger_mouse_tm

YOu seem to be echoing what a lot of people have said. Once they discover that she owns a house here, has an irish PRSI number and has legal residency here (although not a citizen yet), she has no right to have a UK car here. Although as you pointed out quite rightly there is slightly less of a chance that she will get caught out.

Understandably, it is frustrating to pay out 5k stg on a car and then another 5k euro to put irish plates on it when the car will only be used here for a max of four months.

I think the most viable option is to buy the car over there, using her friends address for the road tax etc, and maybe after 12 months are up the value of the car will have depreciated enough to make it a worthwhile option to bring the car over here.

L1011

Agustin Substantial Cornbread wrote: »

Most insurance company's offer around 90 days foreign cover so thats the three months covered.

Most of them these days offer unlimited (except by residency rules!) UK/Ireland cover I've found; and mine provides unlimited third party for Europe too, 93 days fully comp.

jimmycrackcorm

Top Dog wrote: »

How'd you work that one out? If she has no proof of address in the UK then she can't have proof of tax or insurance. Only other option is that she's importing - or driving with no insurance.

Until OP can answer the questions posted above there's no other answers can be given really.

I worked that one out easily, being from a border county and having gone through the whole driving a northern car and having been stopped by customs and have to prove my situation to them.

It's very simple; if you have a ferry ticket showing you are going back with the car to the UK then you are little more than a tourist.