Car tax v11 letter - can anyone help?!

[TheSpruce]

I'm grasping at straws here but we've just realized the reminder letter hasn't arrived and we're out of tax in 2 days!! I've spent the last 2 hours trying to find the logbook but as we're in the middle of a renovation and sods law, the fucking thing is nowhere to be found. The website tells me I have to request a new one and it will not arrive in time. We'll be absolutely screwed without a car this week 😥

I've found last 2 years letters, exactly where they're meant to be and exactly where the logbook should be (!!) And can see the main thing that changes about the reference number is the first 4 digits. Someone online suggested these should be the same for everyone each year. Does anyone have the letter and can see what those 4 digits are? The rest from what I can tell stays the same per the vehicle which I have. Last attempt at trying to fix this shit show!

Honestly, why can't I just input my car reg and post code to pay?? What's the worst thing that will happen - someone pays my car tax for me?!

Tax runs out in 2 days - that would make it 3rd October? Do you mean MOT?

Tax expires at the end of each month so either you're out of tax now (it would have run out on 30th September) or you've got to 31st October. If it's October maybe that's why you've not received the V11 yet.

What does the date say on your previous V11s?

Yeah it wouldn't be out in 2 days time as it finishes at the end of a month. But same thing happened to me and it turned out the car hadn't actually been transferred into my name when I bought it from the dealer. I hadn't realised the log book was never sent out to me as we were in the middle of a house move too and paperwork was all over the place. That's why I didn't get a reminder letter because they didn't have my details.

Anyway I phoned them and they got it all sorted out over the phone for me

If you don’t pay you’ll also get a final reminder - I didn’t know this but my manager missed his in July and got one recently

Thanks all, I got my dates confused and it is out today. But fortunately the logbook turned up - Lord knows how it ended up in that box but hey, only 4 hours of searching later!

Glad you got sorted OP. It's horrible when something straightforward goes pear-shaped.

That’s interesting as I didn’t get a v11 letter this year and only realised part way through August when I booked the annual service. Obviously I did not have the reverence number that is on the v11 but I did have the reg documents so was able to pay it immediately online - two weeks late!

Ive now entered that date in my phone diary to repeat each year so I don’t forget again.

I checked online and discovered that the dvla are introducing a new system to get us to set up an account and go paperless, emailing or texting reminders instead - from August 2023. But it is meant to be optional at the moment, we have to opt in so I’ve no idea who I did not get a reminder. I got one last year when the car was a year old, I bought the car new so I know they have my details.

I set mine up to auto renew. Means I don't have to remember!