Declaring a car permanently off road?

sonic85

How's thing's?

My sister is learning to drive and I got my hands on an old car lately for her to drive around a field and practice in. I've forgotten to declare it temporarily off road and now I owe 3 months tax for a car that hasn't seen the road in some time and will never see the road again.

My question is - is there any way of declaring the thing permanently off road so this won't happen again. It seems a bit crazy to me that a person has to continually declare a vehicle off road when it will never leave the back garden.

Thanks!

colm_mcm

If it's never going to be taxed again under your ownership then don't bother doing anything.

mickdw

If it will never go on the road while in current ownership, it makes no odds whether you declare it off or not. Sure you will get reminder letters re tax but legally you cannot be caught for tax in the field and the arrears are not due til you go to actually tax it.

CiniO

sonic85 wrote: »

How's thing's?

My sister is learning to drive and I got my hands on an old car lately for her to drive around a field and practice in. I've forgotten to declare it temporarily off road and now I owe 3 months tax for a car that hasn't seen the road in some time and will never see the road again.

My question is - is there any way of declaring the thing permanently off road so this won't happen again. It seems a bit crazy to me that a person has to continually declare a vehicle off road when it will never leave the back garden.

Thanks!

That's where you get it wrong.
You don't owe the tax for 3 months.

Only if ever decided to bring the car back on the road and tax it again, then you'd be liable for any arrears.
If you're not planning on taxing it yourself, then you don't owe anything.

Skatedude

You can sign the ownership to your sister and then declare it off the road.

coylemj

Skatedude wrote: »

You can sign the ownership to your sister and then declare it off the road.

Not necessary, the other advice is correct - if it is never going to make an appearance on the public road again then OP needs to do nothing. They can remind you to renew the tax until the cows come home but as long as the car is off the road, there is no offence being committed.

To permanently get Shannon off his back for tax renewal, OP will need to trailer it to an authorised treatment facility, hand over the registration cert., get a certificate of destruction and send it to Shannon.

Zoo4m8

Can he not just send the Reg cert to Shannon and declare it scrapped? (As used to be the case)

James Bond Junior

Bring the logbook into the tax office and transfer ownership to your sister. Then fill up the off the road form while there. Will take all of five minutes, I did it this year, twice.

CiniO

James Bond Junior wrote: »

Bring the logbook into the tax office and transfer ownership to your sister. Then fill up the off the road form while there. Will take all of five minutes, I did it this year, twice.

And what would be the benefit to OP of doing so?

James Bond Junior

CiniO wrote: »

And what would be the benefit to OP of doing so?

No more letters from Shannon asking for it to be taxed.

Del2005

James Bond Junior wrote: »

No more letters from Shannon asking for it to be taxed.

So instead of just throwing a letter in the bin they now need to regularly log in and declare a vehicle off the road. Much easier to bin the letters than change ownership IMO.

Yawns

James Bond Junior wrote: »

No more letters from Shannon asking for it to be taxed.

Then the sister will have to declare it every year off the road or get more letters etc if she forgets just once.

As has been said, if it's not going back on the road just ignore the letters. If it's going back on the road, then sign the car over to the sister and have any owed tax wiped off.

James Bond Junior

Del2005 wrote: »

So instead of just throwing a letter in the bin they now need to regularly log in and declare a vehicle off the road. Much easier to bin the letters than change ownership IMO.

Didn't realise it needed to be done yearly. Fair enough, do nothing OP.

CiniO

James Bond Junior wrote: »

No more letters from Shannon asking for it to be taxed.

To be honest I haven't received any tax renewal letter through post in years.
I think once you give them your email address, all corespondence is sent through email.