UK Vehicle and Driving License check on-line, as used by Spanish Police

I had an interesting conversation with my insurance broker a couple of weeks ago about doing checks with the DVLA in Swansea.

Any vehicle can be checked on line via the gov.uk web site if you know the registration number and make. It tells you of the vehicle is taxed and MOT’d. This is open to anybody and the Spanish Police are using it at the roadside to check UK registered vehicles. And the Spanish Police are impounding vehicles on the basis of these checks.

Now that there is no counterpart driving license, by entering your Driver Number, National Insurance Number and Post Code you can get a code to enter when you need to view or print out your current driving status. This was designed to be handed to car hire companies, or employers, who need to verify your license details. It may be a good idea to keep an up to date printout with your passport in case there is a need to discuss the details with the Spanish Police or Guarda Civil at any stage.

There are also plenty of apps that can give you this information on your phone. I use them when looking for cars to buy, they also list all previous MOT failures and advisories (UK plated vehicles), if it has been reported stolen or written off. It is becoming a much smaller world.

Mark

Markfish.

Be careful if you are buying a car and then check out the DVLA / GOV website to see if the car has been stolen or written of as I believe this service was cancelled in 2015 so it might well show up as no write of, or stolen, they do mark the reg docs low down if the car has been an insurance write of, but this is not to be trusted as 100%, better still get a HPI check done.

Also the advisories section is a little bit of a misleading piece of information due to the fact that the EU has a, for the want of better words, a system where they record failures in every EU country that has the yearly car  check, every car goes on it when it fails via with us our DVLA, and then this is checked over to see which country has in effect the largest amount of failures, which can / could be interpreted as to who has the largest amount of unroad worthy cars, UK Mot stations have been quietly asked to "Advise" rather then "Fail" unless of course the car is far to dangerous, hence the large amount of advisories cropping up on MOT certificates now.

I would suggest also having a look at the vehicle Safe Trading Advisory Group web site www.vstag.co.uk for more advice.

The DVLA re-issued every V5c registration document at the end of 2010 due to the loss of many thousand blank docuets. the key change is that they say ib big letter at the top it say "This document is not proof of ownership" it shows only the registered keeper. This has always been the case and it is difficult to find out who has proper titile to a vehicle in the UK, it may be a finance company or another person. The DVLA will not routinely disclose the keeper of a vehicle without good reason and forms filled in.

The original reason for this post was the fact that Spanish Police are doing open source checks on UK vehicles and taking action based on these checks.

Don't forget also that UK crs must now be insured or declared off road (SORN) or you can be fined.

at the top it say "This document is not proof of ownership" it shows only the registered keeper. This has always been the case and it is difficult to find out who has proper titile to a vehicle in the UK, it may be a finance company or another person. The DVLA will not routinely disclose the keeper of a vehicle without good reason and forms filled in.

Thats why I said its best to get a HPI check done if you're thinking of buying a car, you have a good recourse if HPI say it's all clear and later turns out not so.

As you know only the last two owners are recorded on the Reg Documents even though it might say 10 previous owners, if it is now still ongoing, for a fee you can apply to DVLA for all the previous names and address's of owners to back track the vehicles history.

The Spanish police have had the facility to check all UK registered cars for over the last three years or so, maybe longer, if they choose to do so.

If a UK car is listed as permanently exported instead of a SORN then the DVLA web site will return a result of number not existing. That then is of little help to the Spanish police.

If a UK car is listed as permanently exported instead of a SORN then the DVLA web site will return a result of number not existing. That then is of little help to the Spanish police.

Wouldn't it be fair to assume then that if the UK car was permanently exported, it might carry Spanish number plates, so the Spanish cops would then check with the Spanish type of DVLA system, surely thats the only number the Spanish cops would see, wouldn't the then Spanish type DVLA know the previous UK registration number.

And if the UK car was exported, but not registered in Spain, and didn't show up on the UK DVLA site if stopped, would the Spanish cops smell a rat and then compound the car that belonged to nowhere.

On a different side issue I wouldn't take to much notice of the UK DVLA....Sometimes...Because I often send UK cars to France which I know get French plates, I report them as exported, yet they still show up here....Very confusing to say the least.

You are correct baz but there are many UK vehicles running around Spain where this applies. The owners seem to believe they are beating the system.

Just a bit of clarification, as an HPI or similar check will tell you if a vehicle is financed vai a Finance and Leasing Association member. depending on the type of finance, the title of a vehicle may be different.

the actual ownership of a vehicle can be difficult to ascertains as unlike other countries, the UK does not have a central register.

The point of the post is that the Spanish Police are doing checks at the roadside via there smart phones and not via more complicated official routes. An a 'no trace' would be extremely usefull to the Spanish Police. 

Just a bit of clarification, as an HPI or similar check will tell you if a vehicle is financed vai a Finance and Leasing Association member. depending on the type of finance, the title of a vehicle may be different.

If an HPI check shows the car to be financed then you know who the owner is, or more so has first claim on it.

If the Spanish police are not satisfied by who owns the car most likely they would, as the UK cops would / could impound the car until the true owner comes foreward to claim it, then a proof of purchase has to be shown, as is the way the UK works also.