Here's a good question for any legally minded folk out there, brought about by an e-mail I received recently... You can take a vehicle for an MoT test up to a month before the extant certificate expires. If you do so and the vehicle passes you are issued with a certificate that expires twelve months from the expiry of the existing certificate. So, in theory, it is possible to have obtain a certificate that lasts for thirteen months. All well and good... However, if the vehicle fails what is the legal position? Is the original certificate still valid? Having failed the MoT test the vehicle is, potentially, not legally roadworthy. In that case are you committing an offence by knowingly using an unroadworthy vehicle on a public road? This seems like a bit of a legal "minefield" to me. Please note : what I would like is an answer from someone who actually knows the legal position. No offence to anyone else, but opinions based on "perceived wisdom" or just plain guesses will merely confuse the issue...
If it fails it is still covered legally by the original certificate, however; Blog: Can you drive your car if it
An horrendous Grey area and without reading the link I remember past experiences where the tester would stipulate various levels of road unworthiness the highest being that you CANNOT drive the vehicle home and you simply wouldn't be allow to.
The answer is on the govt mot website, I had to look it up last month. Will find link and post when I get home
From Govt website.........that's that question answered in full, I reckon.... [h=2]If your vehicle fails the test[/h] You’ll get a ‘notification of failure’ from the test centre if your vehicle fails the test. The failure will be recorded in the secure central MOT database. You can still drive your vehicle if it fails the test and its existing MOT certificate is still valid (ie you got it tested before the expiry date). However, you might be stopped by police and prosecuted if your vehicle is unroadworthy. If the vehicle fails the test and the certificate has expired, you can only drive it to: a pre-arranged appointment at a garage to have the repairs done a pre-arranged MOT test appointment Your vehicle should be retested at the same test centre which did the original test.
Arquebus is spot on just to add you can also drive to MOT and back untaxed and its fully legal. As Al stated pre-arranged (give the MOT center your registration and keep a note of the phone number of the garage in case you are stopped.) In addition, the test center has to be deemed as within a reasonable distance, it does not have to be the closest, but going to a test center in Birmingham when you live in London is clearly not going to wash. The vehicle has to be driven there by the most direct route and you should not stop on the way (although this was challenged and the case thrown out, but I wouldn't want to risk it). I know this after driving the 1098 there and back for an MOT (without any tax) AFTER I got stopped by plod (on the way back). Had to stand for 20 minutes listening to all his BS and info which was WRONG, that I couldn't drive for an MOT untaxed. Eventually as I challenged him (nicely of course) he obviously thought better of giving me a ticket or summons (through the goodness of his heart you understand) and making himself out to be the arse he clearly was, who did not know the laws he was there to uphold. Ho Hum part of life's rich tapestry John
exactamundo, thats the bit i was referring to in my note above, Al got there to it, before i got home!
I was recently told that if a vehicle fails an MOT you have 10 days grace to have said vehicle repaired and a new MOT issued. After that the existing/valid MOT even if it has 6 months left to run becomes null and void!! I know this because I recently put a car through its MOT and those were the actual parameters. However, if the test is aborted, ie: ran out of fuel, then the test cannot be continued and the original certificate is still valid. For the benefit of you JR ...confused dot com :wink:
Practice and Theory here again. I've known a garage to keep the keys to a vehicle before and with good reason if a real chance of a fatality was possible. As said, a definite grey area.
To clarify - the question is not "does the original MoT certificate remain valid?" : the question is "is it legal to drive the vehicle if it has failed an MoT test, even if the old certificate has not expired?"
20 years dealing with vosa never once got a straight answer. me copper mate says yes you can get done because you know there are faults. he also suggested that should you ever get pulld for a vehicle fault tell them it was ok when you started your journey and stick to it. obviously a tyre with no tread wont wash in court.
I have just spoken to my "local friendly MoT man" about this - his opinion mirrors finm's. He also said he thinks the biggest problem would be that knowingly using a vehicle that had failed an MoT could invalidate your insurance on the grounds that most policies have a "you must maintain your vehicle in a reasonable condition" type of clause...
Agree with, the you can drive back after a failed MOT. The problem here is though (quite apart from insurance which is whole other grey area) that if you get stopped plod will no doubt request to see the MOT certificate. I reckon that you're probably not obliged to show him it BUT If you do he promptly gives you a ticket for whatever the vehicle failed on under Construction & Use Regs If you don't he'll go over the bike with a fine tooth comb until he finds the fault or something else and issues you a ticket under Construction & Use Regs. Not a very satisfactory outcome either way John
Surely it depends on what it failed the test on.A bald tyre is different to a split wiperblade.I wouldn't drive with the first but maybe with the second.
That seemed to be the MoT man's take on it too, Keith; depends on what it failed on... But, Jock, they don't need to see a certificate to know if it's passed or failed an MoT test - it's all on a central computer database...
As others have pointed out, it's the insurance which is a most dangerous aspect here. I'm sure that insurers will always have had some stipulation about maintaining a vehicle in a roadworthy condition, whilst accepting than an unticipated major failure of a well-maintained vehicle would not prevent a claim for accident damage in case of, say, brake failure. However, contemporary policies all seem to stipulate that "an Mot certificate must be held where one is required", or words to that effect, which of course allows for the drive to and from the MoT test, assuming that it was successful, but otherwise means that you are not covered if you have no MoT. What annoys me is that possession of an MoT certificate (except at the exact point in time when it is issued), is in no way a guarantee of roadworthiness, so the insurance company is using it merely as a potential "get out clause". Maybe it's rare for people to get done for no MoT without being guilty of several other offences, but I must say that I have never heard of anyone being done for not having insurance "as a consequence of having no MoT". In that same golden era when insurers did not (at least not universally) insist on possession of an MoT certificate, they would, not unreasonably, have downsized a write-off payment to cater for the fact that a vehicle with no Mot sells for less than one which has a current certificate. I say this as someone who, in my youth, might have considered riding a bike (on a sunny day in the winter, perhaps) when it was still insured but was, perhaps, not taxed and MoTd !
