Insurance details when renewing motor tax

ION08

Why are insurance details required when renewing your Motortax?

I always understood this to be for ANPR reasons, but if so, then why is it possible to input any details which may not be accurate?

Also, in my case, my tax renews every January but my insurance renews the following month.

So effectively, I am renewing tax for 1 year with insurance details that are only valid for 1 more month.

It all seems a bit non-sensical and to be honest it annoys me that I will theoretically be uninsured (in the eyes of motortax.ie/ANPR) from February up until my next Motor Tax renewal next January (when the whole cycle repeats) ..

honda boi

Ye I don't think I've ever put in the right number

ION08

Exactly! Completely non sensical.

Either do away with the stupid requirement or implement a proper system whereby you need to upload a copy of your insurance cert and whereby you can manually update the details as necessary for ANPR accuracy :rolleyes:

uck51js9zml2yt

A car must be insured to be taxed ..but the insurance details are not verified except in the case of 1st time taxing of commercial vehicles.

Could you say your insured and not be? ..YES. But you are signing a statutory declaration that you are insured.

ION08

Brinley CoolS Fungus wrote: »

..you are signing a statutory declaration that you are insured.

...yes, insured for 1 month, and then what? :rolleyes:

LIGHTNING

LIGHTNING wrote: »

I have been putting in random numbers in there for as long as I can rememeber

Last time this was posted some gob****e tried telling me that my insurance would be void if they found out.:rolleyes:

honda boi

Doubt they really care if you insured or not

As long as they get their money why would they

tossy

You can put in any random number ???

All these years i've been paying my insurance just so i had a number to enter when taxing the car FFS!

ION08

honda boi wrote: »

Doubt they really care if you insured or not

As long as they get their money why would they

Fair enough. Then don't ask for it if you don't care.

Typical unnecessary public sector bureaucracy

honda boi

ION08 wrote: »

Fair enough. Then don't ask for it if you don't care.

Typical unnecessary public sector bureaucracy

Ye I don't understand why they actually ask for it.
Waste of a webpage

mgbgt1978

It probably goes back to the old days when you had to renew your Tax in person at the local Motor Tax office (or by post if you really lived out in the sticks).
Back then you had to produce your Insurance cert as part of the process.

The basic RF100A renewal form has barely changed in decades, so presumably the details required remain the same regardless of how you tax your Car.

Agricola

Was in the tax office last year and had filled in the form. Didn't think of the insurance details but didn't think it would matter. Nope. When I went to the counter the jobsworth behind the glass told me she couldn't issue a disk until the insurer / policy number and expiry fields were filled in! She didn't want to see the insurance cert, just fill in the details. Like a fool I trudged out to the car and took the info off the disk.

bazz26

They did have plans to tie into an insurance database for online taxing purposes but like most things in this country it never got past the planning stage.

It's a bit like Irish Water now, probably cost more to remove it than just leave it there.

Schorpio

The fact that we even still NEED disks in this country is bonkers. It's 2018 and we still rely on 3 easily forged bits of paper stuck to our screens. Not only that, but we're requesting the people input their insurance policy number when buying tax, which we don't even bother checking.

IIRC the UK went diskless in 2014 - and even then they only had a single tax disk on display.

We are so backwards.

bazz26

Schorpio wrote: »

The fact that we even still NEED disks in this country is bonkers. It's 2018 and we still rely on 3 easily forged bits of paper stuck to our screens. Not only that, but we're requesting the people input their insurance policy number when buying tax, which we don't even bother checking.

IIRC the UK went diskless in 2014 - and even then they only had a single tax disk on display.

We are so backwards.

Discless tax hasn't worked out too well for the UK:

https://www.theguardian.com/money/2017/nov/16/untaxed-vehicles-uk-trebles-tax-disc-abolition-vehicle-excise-duty-dvla

Agricola

Schorpio wrote: »

The fact that we even still NEED disks in this country is bonkers. It's 2018 and we still rely on 3 easily forged bits of paper stuck to our screens. Not only that, but we're requesting the people input their insurance policy number when buying tax, which we don't even bother checking.

IIRC the UK went diskless in 2014 - and even then they only had a single tax disk on display.

We are so backwards.

Surely in this day n' age, they could develop an app for the guards which scans the reg against a central database and tells them if the car is tested, taxed and insured. Ok so a couple of million would be needed to get that off the ground, but how quickly would it pay for itself over the physical disk situation.
Just seems like a justification for loads of people in tax offices dishing out disks 5 days a week for 4 hours a day!

Schorpio

bazz26 wrote: »

Discless tax hasn't worked out too well for the UK:

https://www.theguardian.com/money/2017/nov/16/untaxed-vehicles-uk-trebles-tax-disc-abolition-vehicle-excise-duty-dvla

Ha, fair point well made! I didn't know that.

Also, the discless system made tax non-transferrable, which in upon itself isn't a bad thing, but conveniently had the side effect that sellers are only refunded whole months, i.e. if you sold your car in mid-July, you will only be refunded tax from August onwards. Whereas the new buyer has to tax immediately, so the DVLA pockets the overlap. So yeah, by no means a perfect system.

I still think we should be able to manage without discs though.

uck51js9zml2yt

Agricola wrote: »

Was in the tax office last year and had filled in the form. Didn't think of the insurance details but didn't think it would matter. Nope. When I went to the counter the jobsworth behind the glass told me she couldn't issue a disk until the insurer / policy number and expiry fields were filled in! She didn't want to see the insurance cert, just fill in the details. Like a fool I trudged out to the car and took the info off the disk.

That "jobsworth" was just doing her job and didn't want to be pulled up over it when the forms were checked later that day.

Its currently the law that a vehicle must be insured to be taxed. If you have an issue, talk to your local politician.

The details arent checked but you are signing a statutory declaration that everything in the form is correct. Should the form be pulled by the Gardai a false declaration is subject to penalties.

The chances of this are slim but AGS do request tax forms from time to time as part of an investigation.

ION08

Brinley CoolS Fungus wrote: »

That "jobsworth" was just doing her job and didn't want to be pulled up over it when the forms were checked later that day.

Its currently the law that a vehicle must be insured to be taxed. If you have an issue, talk to your local politician.

The details arent checked but you are signing a statutory declaration that everything in the form is correct. Should the form be pulled by the Gardai a false declaration is subject to penalties.

The chances of this are slim but AGS do request tax forms from time to time as part of an investigation.

Yes but its a s**te system for the purposes of ensuring that a vehicle is insured before taxation and I fail to see what the current setup achieves or what benefit it would serve if AGS requested the form for the purpose of an investigation.

This is a process that should either be done properly or not at all.

dr.fuzzenstein

ION08 wrote: »

Yes but its a s**te system for the purposes of ensuring that a vehicle is insured before taxation and I fail to see what the current setup achieves or what benefit it would serve if AGS requested the form for the purpose of an investigation.

This is a process that should either be done properly or not at all.

Absolutely that a thousand times.
The current system is just a bit, well I can't say the word I had in mind, so let's just say inefficient, badly thought out and implemented and in the end probably completely compromised by different unions and interest groups in a manner that is strongly associated with this green Isle, starts with Oi....
Something that'll work in any country in Europe, but is completely impossible in Ireland for various bonkers reasons.
Just think watercharges. A system that is completely reasonable and works in the entire world (pay for the water you use), which brings out the foam at the mouth tin foil hat brigade.
Personal ID cards (absolutely fantastic, works for banking, social services, travel and much more), same as above.
Just half-implement something and halfway through just leave it because "Ah shure begrandterfcuk"