HELPDESK:Answering all your motoring queries
From ST: Since my wife lost her job I can’t afford to keep two cars on the road. I don’t want to sell it just yet in case she gets another job. I’ve read that you can park up a car and not pay road tax on it: is that true? The last bill was for €551 and that’s just too much for a parked car.
You need not pay motor tax if the car is parked privately and not taken out or used in a public place at any time. You need to contact your tax office to alert them of the fact. The good news is there may be an opportunity to get a refund on the tax paid as well, if there is a minimum of three whole calendar months left on the disc.
You will need to surrender the current tax disc at the tax office. Incidentally the same refunds apply to people scrapping their cars with time left on the disc. For this you will need to present the disc along with the certificate of destruction issued by the End of Life authorised treatment facility (or scrapyard as it is known to you and I).
From C O’Shea: What do the new NCT rules mean when I go to change my tyres? If these tyres aren’t legal, why are they being sold? I can’t find an E-mark on the tyres. Will they fail the test or will it apply only when I change my tyres?
No, it applies immediately and your car will not pass the test unless they carry the E-mark. Call into a local garage and ask them to look for the E-mark as it might not be that clear and they will know where to look. If the tyres don’t carry the E-mark, you need to change them before the test.
According to a spokeswoman from the Irish Tyre Industry Association: “It is illegal to sell tyres without an E-mark so there would be queries as to where you bought these tyres . . . There really shouldn’t be many on the roads and certainly not for sale. People looking to save money at present should avoid cutting back on the rubber on the road.”
There’s a postcard-size amount of rubber connecting each wheel to the road that could mean the difference between life and death.
From JG: I’m set to buy a used car from a dealer in Wales and bring it in. I’m saving about €5,000 on a similar car that I was about to buy from a Dublin dealer. My question is this: the talk in the UK papers is that if there is a hung parliament next month the pound will fall. That will bring the price down even further. Should I hold off?
To answer this you need a crystal ball. There are plenty of indications that a hung parliament will bring down the value of the pound. If that happens then yes, you could save money.
Others may be waiting for a similar drop in the pound, but it’s important to remember that while there might be an initial drop in price, car executives have already indicated they are unhappy the fall in the pound is eating away their margins.
The likelihood is that car prices will rise in the UK in the near future. Again, that’s dependent on the quality of our crystal ball.