Declaring non-use of car for motor tax

gebbel

In the Garda station in Drogheda yesterday getting a passport photo stamped, there were 8 people in the queue before me. Couldn't help but observe that 6 of them were getting motor tax forms stamped for non use of the car. The Garda just stamped them without asking any questions. I think it is fair to assume that some people ride their luck when their tax expires and try to nick a month or two for free. If so, then the state must be losing a small fortune. Why don't the Gardai at least input their reg and see if their story checks out. With all the tolls and speed cameras etc. about then surely there should be a way to find out the bluffers. Or it is that simple?

Al Capwned

Hope not - i'm trying to get to April.....

gebbel

Risky game. I have been stopped at three checkpoints since Xmas!

For Forks Sake

gebbel wrote: »

In the Garda station in Drogheda yesterday getting a passport photo stamped, there were 8 people in the queue before me. Couldn't help but observe that 6 of them were getting motor tax forms stamped for non use of the car. The Garda just stamped them without asking any questions. I think it is fair to assume that some people ride their luck when their tax expires and try to nick a month or two for free. If so, then the state must be losing a small fortune. Why don't the Gardai at least input their reg and see if their story checks out. With all the tolls and speed cameras etc. about then surely there should be a way to find out the bluffers. Or it is that simple?

Had the new car off the road for Feb as no log book, when I went to the station to get the form stamped, the duty garda did go and run it through the system before she signed it.

ted1

I got caught bluffing. Misses car wasn't taxed for a while. Went to get the form signed. Garda checked pulse system and said the car had being noted as being parked in a public place without tax.

gebbel

ted1 wrote: »

I got caught bluffing. Misses car wasn't taxed for a while. Went to get the form signed. Garda checked pulse system and said the car had being noted as being parked in a public place without tax.

Noted by who?

ted1

ted1 wrote: »

I got caught bluffing. Misses car wasn't taxed for a while. Went to get the form signed. Garda checked pulse system and said the car had being noted as being parked in a public place without tax.

Pity the likes of you aren't prosecuted for making a false declaration to a Garda.

db330

It's not uncommon for people to do 3months on 3months off taxing. I know of 2 friends who do it due to the cost of tax.

one guy has a 2.5l, so ~ €1300 per year, and another 3.0l, so ~ €1600, that price for road is just absurd so i certainly don't blame them. So far they have never had to much as far as i'm aware.

But when my tax runs out and i've forgotten to renew it for whatever reason i'll go in and get the form stamped. Never had any hassle with it.

ted1

gebbel wrote: »

ted1 wrote: »

I got caught bluffing. Misses car wasn't taxed for a while. Went to get the form signed. Garda checked pulse system and said the car had being noted as being parked in a public place without tax.

Noted by who?

A garda.

Buffman

gebbel wrote: »

Why don't the Gardai at least input their reg and see if their story checks out.

40% of Garda stations don't have the internet, so can't check anyhthing.

Now, I'd imagine a station the size of Drogheda does, but you say there were 6 people in the queue with tax forms in front of you. So, would you have minded waiting while the Garda went of to run a check on each of those?

kirving

ted1 wrote: »

gebbel wrote: »

ted1 wrote: »

I got caught bluffing. Misses car wasn't taxed for a while. Went to get the form signed. Garda checked pulse system and said the car had being noted as being parked in a public place without tax.

Noted by who?

A garda.

ANPR could catch a load of people. Not sure if it's used to retrospectively catch people who try to declare a car off the road. No need to catch people who intend to pay late but don't gain an advantage. Easy job to log all cars which pass an ANPR camera, when, and where via gps.

gebbel

Buffman wrote: »

Now, I'd imagine a station the size of Drogheda does, but you say there were 6 people in the queue with tax forms in front of you. So, would you have minded waiting while the Garda went of to run a check on each of those?

Yes I would. But it bothers me more that this evasion, which is evidently happening on such a large scale, has not been tackled. It doesn't happen in the UK, where the onus is on the owner to declare the car off the road from the first day it is off the road, not retrospectively.

pa990

The gardai are there to witness the signature.. not to check whether or not its a true declaration

Jimdagym

gebbel wrote: »

Yes I would. But it bothers me more that this evasion, which is evidently happening on such a large scale, has not been tackled. It doesn't happen in the UK, where the onus is on the owner to declare the car off the road from the first day it is off the road, not retrospectively.

You are assuming an awful lot. I know several people who have left their car off the road for a month or two as they literally could not afford to tax it. Not everyone is scamming.

djimi

gebbel wrote: »

Yes I would. But it bothers me more that this evasion, which is evidently happening on such a large scale, has not been tackled. It doesn't happen in the UK, where the onus is on the owner to declare the car off the road from the first day it is off the road, not retrospectively.

If someone is prepared to make a false declaration then I doubt they would think twice about declaring the car off the road for a few months and hoping they dont get caught/avoid the M50...

galwaytt

gebbel wrote: »

Buffman wrote: »

It doesn't happen in the UK, where the onus is on the owner to declare the car off the road from the first day it is off the road, not retrospectively.

Actually, it does. That's why they use ANPR so much, because non-tax, non-MOT,, and even worse, non-insurance is rampant.

Anan1

djimi wrote: »

If someone is prepared to make a false declaration then I doubt they would think twice about declaring the car off the road for a few months and hoping they dont get caught/avoid the M50...

The advantage of the new system is that when they are caught they get gone to town on.

djimi

Anan1 wrote: »

The advantage of the new system is that when they are caught they get gone to town on.

And rightly so!

Anan1

djimi wrote: »

And rightly so!

That's why I said advantage.;)

Voodoomelon

Not sure if the OP is a little naive or testing the water to see what the reaction is, but the Gardaí spend all day, every day, stamping those forms. The tax system allows it and everyone abuses the hell out of it. Its the governments fault for making it so ridiculously easy to avoid tax; this, combined with 1-2 months unofficial grace with most Gardaí make it possible to reduce your tax by at least a third every year.

Add to this that probably at least 1 in 4 people do this (especially now), no wonder tax take is down.

TPM

pa990 wrote: »

The gardai are there to witness the signature.. not to check whether or not its a true declaration

Exactly,
the gardai dont check the validity of the information you have filled in, just that you are legally declaring that the information is true. They dont really care if you are chancing your arm, but if you got caught out it could be a serious legal matter

Anan1

Voodoomelon wrote: »

Not sure if the OP is a little naive or testing the water to see what the reaction is, but the Gardaí spend all day, every day, stamping those forms. The tax system allows it and everyone abuses the hell out of it. Its the governments fault for making it so ridiculously easy to avoid tax; this, combined with 1-2 months unofficial grace with most Gardaí make it possible to reduce your tax by at least a third every year.

Add to this that probably at least 1 in 4 people do this (especially now), no wonder tax take is down.

The government should close the loophole, there's no doubt about that. But it's still the fault of the people making the false declarations.

Voodoomelon

TPM wrote: »

Exactly,
the gardai dont check the validity of the information you have filled in, just that you are legally declaring that the information is true. They dont really care if you are chancing your arm, but if you got caught out it could be a serious legal matter

Just to clarify this, whilst I understand the offence of making a false declaration, under what circumstance would it become apparent that you're making one?

I also understand that if it was their job to check if you had a speeding ticket, traffic stop etc in the mean time, you would be caught out.

But as their job is ONLY to stamp the form, boom, stamped, and you walk out, when exactly does the false declarant get caught?

keithsfleet

Voodoomelon wrote: »

Not sure if the OP is a little naive or testing the water to see what the reaction is, but the Gardaí spend all day, every day, stamping those forms. The tax system allows it and everyone abuses the hell out of it. Its the governments fault for making it so ridiculously easy to avoid tax; this, combined with 1-2 months unofficial grace with most Gardaí make it possible to reduce your tax by at least a third every year.

Add to this that probably at least 1 in 4 people do this (especially now), no wonder tax take is down.

Official or unofficial there is no "grace period".
Just because one Garda is willing to let it slide doesn't mean the Garda 2 miles down the road will.
If you drive without tax, same thing with insurance, don't go giving out when you get caught. To get a licence you need to know the rules of the road, if you don't know the rules you shouldn't have a licence.

Saying that, i have regularly in the past driven my car with no tax but i understand and accept the risk.

Anan1

Voodoomelon wrote: »

Just to clarify this, whilst I understand the offence of making a false declaration, under what circumstance would it become apparent that you're making one?

I also understand that if it was their job to check if you had a speeding ticket, traffic stop etc in the mean time, you would be caught out.

But as their job is ONLY to stamp the form, boom, stamped, and you walk out, when exactly does the false declarant get caught?

You're right, they won't unless someone checks. That's the beauty of the proposed system of declaring the car off the road in advance - get caught driving and they've got you bang to rights.

Voodoomelon

keithsfleet wrote: »

Official or unofficial there is no "grace period".
Just because one Garda is willing to let it slide doesn't mean the Garda 2 miles down the road will.
If you drive without tax, same thing with insurance, don't go giving out when you get caught. To get a licence you need to know the rules of the road, if you don't know the rules you shouldn't have a licence.

Saying that, i have regularly in the past driven my car with no tax but i understand and accept the risk.

Hence, "unofficial", im well aware of the law. Gardaí have better things to be doing than stopping 25% of traffic with no tax. If I was a Garda right now, I would n me arse be bothered about out of date tax, nobody bloody has it.

Bohrio

gebbel wrote: »

Yes I would. But it bothers me more that this evasion, which is evidently happening on such a large scale, has not been tackled. It doesn't happen in the UK, where the onus is on the owner to declare the car off the road from the first day it is off the road, not retrospectively.

Also UK Taxes are cheaper than in Ireland. And not to mention their police cars can automatically scan vehicles for tax/insurance while on the move, dont think we have that here in ireland.

There are months when I dont use the car not even a single day, 1 day the most. And I am paying a bit less than 200 euro per month for this. More then once I have felt tempted of doing this. When I had my previous car, although tax was only 156 per year, give or take... I remember not using the car for months! Glad you can do it tbh, where I am from Tax is none refundable, you pay for the whole year whether you use the car or not, it is ten times cheaper but still pretty handy

dr.fuzzenstein

Voodoomelon wrote: »

Not sure if the OP is a little naive or testing the water to see what the reaction is, but the Gardaí spend all day, every day, stamping those forms. The tax system allows it and everyone abuses the hell out of it. Its the governments fault for making it so ridiculously easy to avoid tax; this, combined with 1-2 months unofficial grace with most Gardaí make it possible to reduce your tax by at least a third every year.

Add to this that probably at least 1 in 4 people do this (especially now), no wonder tax take is down.

All the government is going to do is hike up tax. It's the easiest way, requires no thought and effort.
So the people who are honest and pay up, pay for the ones that scam the system, an Irish solution to an Irish problem.
Annoys the hell out of me, the system needs to be overhauled so people can't abuse it so easily, tax take would be up and taxes wouldn't need to be hiked all the time, because less and less people are paying.
With more tax hikes on the way and no changes, more people will simply not pay, so tax gets hiked again.
It's just evidende that there's no logic here, no thinking and an almost superhuman will to simply take the laziest path possible by the government.
It actually encourages abuse.
In fact, if you pay every cent, you are the fool, because the system assumes a certain amount of abuse and overcharges you, you pay too much if you are honest.

531

Wouldn't it be fairer then to scrap the current motor tax system and put an extra tax on fuel instead? That way, the greater the use the more tax paid. Surely the emissions based assessment sytem for cars is similar - the more fuel you use, the more you pollute, the more you pay. Much simpler to operate for the Govt and less easy for tax dodgers.

What are the arguments against this?

Anan1

531 wrote: »

What are the arguments against this?

Same as always, it'd have to be done in the North too.

531

531 wrote: »

Wouldn't it be fairer then to scrap the current motor tax system and put an extra tax on fuel instead? That way, the greater the use the more tax paid. Surely the emissions based assessment sytem for cars is similar - the more fuel you use, the more you pollute, the more you pay. Much simpler to operate for the Govt and less easy for tax dodgers.

What are the arguments against this?

Oh ffs not this again :rolleyes:
We're sick to feck of this suggestion :pac:

Uncle Ben

Just drive for 2 months without the tax, most guards i've met will give 6 to 8 weeks grace, then on the start of the third month get the RF100 stamped, I think that's the form, and carry it in the car, if caught just say your on your way to do it and get it done, if not continue onto month 4 and then get it taxed for 3 months.

I'm not particularly happy doing this but it is down to cost. Another anomaly in all of this, is the fact that I could drive to my local NCT garage without tax and go through the test and then go up to the local co.co. the following week and get the tax on the car even though i've produced the documentation stating the car was off the road, yet the NCT cert shows the opposite. Its not only the guards that don't look at forms, other than name, address and cost.

dahamsta

RoverJames wrote: »

531 wrote: »

Wouldn't it be fairer then to scrap the current motor tax system and put an extra tax on fuel instead? That way, the greater the use the more tax paid. Surely the emissions based assessment sytem for cars is similar - the more fuel you use, the more you pollute, the more you pay. Much simpler to operate for the Govt and less easy for tax dodgers.

What are the arguments against this?

Oh ffs not this again :rolleyes:
We're sick to feck of this suggestion :pac:

I'm not. And apparently a rake of other people aren't either. Go figure, other people have opinions!

dahamsta

dahamsta wrote: »

I'm not. And apparently a rake of other people aren't either. Go figure, other people have opinions!

There have been plenty of threads about it, this one is about declaring non use of a car for motor tax, not should motor tax be scrapped and a tax put on fuel to replace it

If people want to talk about putting motor tax on fuel there are threads there just for that discussion.

Max_Charger

On the week where the government declare raising motor tax is in the pipeline because they are loosing money, I'm reading this crap about people riding the system and who suffers?, people like me you are honest and decent who pay full whack like an idiot. I hope they all get the car impounded at a check point, serves them right.

dahamsta

RoverJames wrote: »

dahamsta wrote: »

I'm not. And apparently a rake of other people aren't either. Go figure, other people have opinions!

There have been plenty of threads about it, this one is about declaring non use of a car for motor tax, not should motor tax be scrapped and a tax put on fuel to replace it

If people want to talk about putting motor tax on fuel there are threads there just for that discussion.

It's a thread about motor tax. If a user wants to highlight another flaw in the system, that's their lookout. If RJ or you don't want to engage with it, here's an idea: don't engage with it.

User Friendly

Max_Charger wrote: »

On the week where the government declare raising motor tax is in the pipeline because they are loosing money, I'm reading this crap about people riding the system and who suffers?, people like me you are honest and decent who pay full whack like an idiot. I hope they all get the car impounded at a check point, serves them right.

:rolleyes: stay hoping Max,but that wont be happening

531

Anan1 wrote: »

Same as always, it'd have to be done in the North too.

Fair point Anan1. I am more familiar with the cycling than the motoring forums on boards. People seem angrier over here!:mad:

But to be fair, I have had some great motoring advice here.

I didn't mean to cause a row!

dahamsta

TBH I'd love to see a few people prosecuted for this too, if only because it'd probably discourage others from doing it, raise the tax take, and we could use that as a stick to beat down talk of another ridiculous change to the system.

Of course seeing people getting hit for fraud would be a nice bonus. If you can't afford to run a car, take the bus, asshat.

Jimdagym

RoverJames wrote: »

There have been plenty of threads about it, this one is about declaring non use of a car for motor tax, not should motor tax be scrapped and a tax put on fuel to replace it

If people want to talk about putting motor tax on fuel there are threads there just for that discussion.

I think you are being a bit harsh rj. The thread drifted towards how people take advantage of the system and 531 asked would this way not be fairer. I don't think it was in any way unreasonable.

RoverJames

RoverJames wrote: »

Oh ffs not this again :rolleyes:
We're sick to feck of this suggestion :pac:

Jimdagym wrote: »

I think you are being a bit harsh rj. The thread drifted towards how people take advantage of the system and 531 asked would this way not be fairer. I don't think it was in any way unreasonable.

I used a nice smiley in my post

Dahamsta got his knickers in a twist so than I explained where I was coming from.

dahamsta

The :rolleyes: is the smiley equivalent of the lowest form of wit.

My underpants are very comfortable, I'm simply tired of the negativity towards the proposal, with pat responses like "it'll never happen". If people keep dismissing it, then of course it won't; however if people actually embraced the idea, or even just kept their mouth shut instead of bitching about it in a completely unreasonable way with absolutely no value, then we might actually move, ever so slowly, towards a more equitable motor tax system.

dahamsta

dahamsta wrote: »

The :rolleyes: is the smiley equivalent of the lowest form of wit.

My underpants are very comfortable, I'm simply tired of the negativity towards the proposal, with pat responses like "it'll never happen". If people keep dismissing it, then of course it won't; however if people actually embraced the idea, or even just kept their mouth shut instead of bitching about it in a completely unreasonable way with absolutely no value, then we might actually move, ever so slowly, towards a more equitable motor tax system.

I was on about the other smiley I used. I believe we will be moving to a more equitable motor tax system.

johnos1984

RoverJames wrote: »

I was on about the other smiley I used. I believe we will be moving to a more equitable motor tax system.

Does that mean drivers of shyte old cars like MG's will get cheaper tax :pac:

dahamsta

The other smiley is a Pacman. I don't even know what that'a supposed to represent. I'm playing? I'm outdated? I'm trying to relive my teenage years? (See, that's a proper smiley.)

The new system won't be more equitable. It'll be a hack of the previous two systems. A bad hack. I guarantee it.

bladebrew

is there a new system coming in?, i think the goverment may have realised a lot of cars are in the lower tax bands so they may have to charge these people more,
as mentioned our current system in silly, anyone can walk in and say my car was off the road and get away with a few months of tax, very open to abuse, i know someone who actually does this, i hope she gets caught out someday tbh,

dahamsta

bladebrew wrote: »

is there a new system coming in?

There's another thread about it in the forum. Can't link to it, on mobile.

Bohrio

Although there will always be people cheating the system I must say that the best way to decrease the price. Also, people probably find it hard to justify why Road Tax is so expensive compare to the rest of Europe. Same as with VRT. I mean, in all fairness what makes us so special that we have to pay 69000 euro for a Tuareg where you can buy the exact same model for 52000 in Spain?

And that's the first example I looked for. A golf price starts from 19200 euro where it costs 17750 in spain.

I have only seen similar costs in countries in south america where having a car is very very expensive.

I mean ... bringing a GTR 2010 from UK has a 42000 euro VRT on top of it? you could buy a house in the UK and register the car there for that price! how dont you expect people to cheat

and so far I have always paid my taxes but it does feel money wasted. Same as the TV license etc etc etc

rebel.ranter

I have to say, I'm tempted to go down the road of 3 months on, 1 month off. I've a car that I only use at the weekend yet it costs €1294 a year to tax. When you see others that use their car everyday & declare their car off the road for 2 month spells at a time it is sickening, I'm making up the difference by paying.
I'd be all for a SORN type system where you declare a car off the road in advance, it might cut down the amount of dodging that's going on & maybe increase the motor tax take meaning they don't have to rise it again & again for those of us that do pay.

Henry Ford III

A SORN type system cannot come soon enough. In it you declare the vehicle off the road before the period of non use.

It's then easy for the feds to see (using ANPR) who has no tax. A fine arrives automatically in the post.

Mr.Biscuits

Has a date been announced for the scraping of the current option of retrospectively declaring a car 'off-the-road'?

Also, will the new system allow for parking 'off-the-road' cars on public roads? (as I had read somewhere, think its was The Times).