Buying a UK reg car

hairyprincess

I'm in the market for a new car. Possibly a Passat, I drove one last year while my own car was in the garage and I fell in love with it. I'm not ready yet to buy but I've been checking out specs and prices on dd.

I've noticed an awful lot of UK regs. Are there any issues with buying a UK import? Are there better specs in them? What should I be looking for and what is there to be wary of?

armaghlad

hairyprincess wrote: »

I'm in the market for a new car. Possibly a Passat, I drove one last year while my own car was in the garage and I fell in love with it. I'm not ready yet to buy but I've been checking out specs and prices on dd.

I've noticed an awful lot of UK regs. Are there any issues with buying a UK import? Are there better specs in them? What should I be looking for and what is there to be wary of?

Clocked mileage. A car like a passat could do huge motorway miles. Then be tampered with and sold on.. a friend of mine bought a car in tyrone (she's from the south) but it was originally English. Gave her nothing but bother. Also be wary some Passats are due a recall this year.

Atlantic Dawn

Put the reg through this checker first for an initial MOT report listing and then before purchase do a full history check https://www.gov.uk/check-mot-history

hairyprincess

Atlantic Dawn wrote: »

Put the reg through this checker first for an initial MOT report listing and then before purchase do a full history check https://www.gov.uk/check-mot-history

That's great thanks

hairyprincess

What about specs? I've seen bluemotion, comfortline and highline; I think! What's the difference in them all?

mickdw

hairyprincess wrote: »

What about specs? I've seen bluemotion, comfortline and highline; I think! What's the difference in them all?

What year are you thinking?
specs go from low end Trendline to Comfortline to highline.
The uk specs might be different.

You need to be very careful. Do your checks, Do not buy without history and if you are thinking reasonably expensive car, follow up the history by making a few calls to dealers who did service work.
Watch out for the too good to be true donedeal specials. They will be for sale on uk plate, bought for a song with massive mileage them clocked and sold reasonably cheap here but nowhere near cheap enough for what they are.

bazz26

Bluemotion is VW talk for lower emissions/higher fuel economy tuned engines.
Without knowing the specific year of Passat you are looking at then it's hard to tell you what spec each trim level has.

Baseline or Trendline are the basic spec model and tend to be bare enough. Next up is Comfortline, Sportline and then Highline in that order. These are Irish specs. UK specs are different again where you have S, SE, Sport and SES or Highline, where some are both higher or lower spec than Irish models.

grogi

bazz26 wrote: »

Bluemotion is VW talk for lower emissions/higher fuel economy tuned engines.

It sounds it uses AdBlue.

bazz26

AdBlue was only introduced to higher powered ones in the last few years. I had a 2011 VAG 2.0 TDi Bluemotion and it didn't use AdBlue.

colm_mcm

The older bluemotion ones had different gear ratios for extra mpg

hairyprincess

Talk about confusing!!

I should have about €14-15k to spend including what I would hope to get on my own car as trade in. What could I get with that money?

colm_mcm

What car do you have at the moment?

masit

First of all it illegal to sell a UK reg car here so I'd say its illegal to buy one too. Then when you go to vrt the car you would have no invoice from the UK to show the date you bought car, the car could be in the country for more than 30 days and then your into a fine from revenue. As said above, if it's to good to be ture it usually is. I've seen UK reg cars on donedeal for feck all and I'm wondering how on hells earth are they selling them for the price they are.

hairyprincess

colm_mcm wrote: »

What car do you have at the moment?

I have a 08 Nissan note, 1.6l diesel with about 220,000km on the clock. Getting 51mpg.

hairyprincess

masit wrote: »

First of all it illegal to sell a UK reg car here so I'd say its illegal to buy one too. Then when you go to vrt the car you would have no invoice from the UK to show the date you bought car, the car could be in the country for more than 30 days and then your into a fine from revenue. As said above, if it's to good to be ture it usually is. I've seen UK reg cars on donedeal for feck all and I'm wondering how on hells earth are they selling them for the price they are.

I did wonder about the legality aspect of it alright. It seems to be dealers selling a lot of them, not just private sellers.

masit

hairyprincess wrote: »

I did wonder about the legality aspect of it alright. It seems to be dealers selling a lot of them, not just private sellers.

Well most dealers would have a Tan number which allows them to have UK reg cars on their property until they sell them.

hairyprincess

masit wrote: »

Well most dealers would have a Tan number which allows them to have UK reg cars on their property until they sell them.

Ah ok, that's interesting. I see some dealers have the cost of the vrt included in the price and others don't. Is there a reason for the dealer not doing the vrt themselves?

I heard on the radio today the recalls are going to be phased throughout the year.

bazz26

They are probably not registered as dealers and get the buyer to VRT the car themselves to stay below Revenue's radar. Proper dealers are required to VRT the car on the buyer's behalf as part of the sale.

fire_man

I have entered a UK reg into MOT website and not showing up, any reason for this?

Esel

fire_man wrote: »

I have entered a UK reg into MOT website and not showing up, any reason for this?

Do you need to put the make in as well?

Was checking a Merc on DVLA and it didn't recognise Mercedes-Benz but did Mercedes.

fire_man

Ya I entered both no luck.

CarrickMcJoe

Was it a NI reg? They don't show up.

ShaunieVW

masit wrote: »

First of all it illegal to sell a UK reg car here so I'd say its illegal to buy one too. Then when you go to vrt the car you would have no invoice from the UK to show the date you bought car, the car could be in the country for more than 30 days and then your into a fine from revenue. As said above, if it's to good to be ture it usually is. I've seen UK reg cars on donedeal for feck all and I'm wondering how on hells earth are they selling them for the price they are.

Myself, parents and brother have bought 3 cars since January. I went to England for mine, Both others were bought local enough on UK plates. One of them was a highline 12 reg passat actually, We did a lot of homework before hand, as many checks as we could and gave them proper look overs. We also had no issues VRTing them at all. If you lack an invoice all that they need is a scrap of paper stating the reg and the day it was bought. Not even a signature from the other party was required. I for one will always head to the UK for cars now. Not to save money but for sheer choice and decent spec cars.

fire_man

It could be, this is the reg YEGI HBK, any way of checking northern Ireland cars out?

alan partridge aha

fire_man wrote: »

It could be, this is the reg YEGI HBK, any way of checking northern Ireland cars out?

That GI should be 61 I'd say, you have no numbers in that reg plate. If you enter 61 it comes up as 2011 Golf.

fire_man

thanks you are right, hard to read reg on ad.