Nasty letter from DVLA ...help

[Ja1983]

in the post this morning (saturday) i had a letter from the DVLA... i opened it to find the following:

"Failure to notify of disposal  of vehicle: H*** obo (my old pickup)

i have received information  which indicates that you were no longer the keeper of the above vehicle on 02/08/2007. you do not appear to have notified us of the disposal of this vehicle and should be advised that this is an offence

we now request that you take action on either A or B below.

A) if you were the person responsible for this offence, you can avoid court action  by paying an out of court settlement.  The amount is £55 to be received at this office by 24/11/2007. however if payment is received by 17/11/2007 this amount will be reduced to £35 etc...

B) If you are not responsible for this offence, you are required by law to give information about who was using or keeping the vehicle at the time of the alleged offence. please complete the statement overleaf and return thisd notice to the above address by 24/11/2007. failure to provide this information is an offence..."


i sent the completed form off to the DVLA the day after i sold it, and i dont have the new keepers details as thats what gets put on the form that you send off..

the first part of the the letter says they have received information that i was no longer the keeper on 02/08....


any suggestions what t o do now, as i will be giving them a phonecall monday morning when the offices are open...

thanks

[thermidorthelobster]

If you DID notify them, then section B applies - you need to notify them of the new owner, but given you don't know who it is, can you put on the form that you don't have an address for them?

Didn't the V5 have a bit you tear off and keep?  I can't remember what goes on that bit...

[karlo]

Write back and tell them you sent the form via royal mail the following day (date).

[Garin]

After the hassle I had a while back (6 speeding tickets in a car I hadn't owned for 9 months) I photocopy the logbook before I send it to the DVLA, you should get a letter back from the DVLA after a couple of weeks saying you are no longer the keeper, even though I had this letter the DVLA informed the police I was the last registered keeper it appears that they are a law unto themselves, if all else fails write to your MP it worked for me

[simdeb]

we had a similar thing with sorn ended up paying the fine but because we disputed it we had to pay the largest amount????

when we send anything that we think is very important through the post office we ask for poof of posting its free and it sort of covers you

[datalas]

The trouble is that since moving down here I personally wouldn't trust the post office to put on a hat.  I think it's just generally bad timing on my part but they really are useless, I've lost more ebay auctions than enough, and those that have arrived have been sat on for six weeks [1]

The insurance and guarantee on the Royal Mail parcels is ridiculous, I *needed* some documents down here so they were sent next day by 11am guarantee service, they arrived three days later...  When I challenged this I was told I could claim the difference between regular posting and the guaranteed version back, so basically they get to charge you slightly more on the off chance they actually do their job right..

Anyhow, with the DVLA isn't there a local office you could pop to to sort it out ?  I've been told there's one in Portsmouth for example, it might be better if you can talk to a real live human being [2] and it might also expedite matters.





[1] Dual meaning intended, yes they've been delayed, but also have all the hall marks of having been used as a seat

[2] although, the chances of them working for the DVLA is rather slim

[Terranosaurus]

IU had this a few years back, a quick call to the local office that had issued the notice sorted it out there and then on the phone.

[Range Rover Blues]

Me too, sold a Capri last year, they guy who bought it I know but he never got the V5 back.  They let him surrender the raod tax when he sold it (abroad) but wouldn't let him tax it.  Now I have to pay the fine.

Aparently unles you get photograpohic evidence that you have nailed it to their foreheads, witnessed in triplicate, then the fact that you sent them the document counts for nothing.

Photocopy, registered post.

For now you'll have to ring them, as said there is no bit of the V5 for you to keep in case the DVLA turn out to be an incompetant bunch of (insert insult of your choice here), the responsibilty lies on the new owner to reaslise he hasn't got it.

[Ja1983]

thanks for the support, fingers crrossed i get through to someone sensible.. there is another quirk.. i`ve looked at my insurance docs, and i got my disco the day after.. namely the 10/8/07.... so why are they saying they have infor that i was no longer the keeper on 02/08/07???!?

really annoyed over this, and worse still i`ve had to stew over the weekend because they are too slack to work weekends!
       

watch this space...... :roll:

[SHERMAN TANK]

Not sure you will get any joy will a phone call now. I just got stung for a car i sold 14 months ago with six months tax. I had no proof of the guys address aven though i had sent the V5 to DVLA. I had to pay £40 but was not allowed to disscuss the dispute on the phone it all has to be done via the ever reliable postal service.

Good luck but i can see you shelling out in the end.

[skip]

The DVLA are awful and the Royal Mail even worse. I had some poor blokes divorce paper come through the door a few weeks ago, He didn't even live in the same county.

It just seems were being made to pay for everybody elses mistakes these days an i'm pretty fed up with it :twisted:

[Ja1983]

Update, sorry for the delay!

well i spoke to a very anal lady, who didnt seem to care one tiny bit.. she told me to tick the box to say i had sent the details, and not worry about it any further... think i`d ust caught her on her way out to lunch!

..so note on form to confirm the ohonecall, box ticked, form posted.......



fingers crossed!


although i suspect that what may have happened is the new owner has got impatient, sent off to order a V5, and put the wrong date, result, DVLA got two forms and got knickers in a twist...

hopefully rthis should be the back of it aNYWAY!