To be very upset we’ve been driving around in uninsured vehicle

[BlueFairiesinthesky]

Just stopped by police with young children in car, very upsetting as was accused of driving an unregistered/ uninsured vehicle.

Our car was purchased new from the official dealership 3 years ago. We’ve had two official services and been insured through legit insurers since. The number plate is wrong by one letter! All documentation has the wrong license number. However the ownership paper does state a different license number, which I assume is the correct one.

Obviously we should have picked up on the discrepancy, my only excuse is we had a newborn at the time!

The police said we’ve been driving around uninsured for 3 years and If we’d had an accident would be fully liable for damage and personal injury.

We plan to visit the dealership tomorrow but just after any advice as I feel really angry about it. I don’t understand how this could have happened and feel really angry that we’ve been driving around at risk.

I don’t think we should drive the car until they can install the correct number plate. Which is an inconvenience. I’ve also paid £650 of useless insurance.

Whilst yes, an error has been made, it’s your car and ultimately you are responsibly for checking the documentation is correct and everything matches. You cannot solely blame the garage, you are as much to blame. Plus, having a newborn is a ridiculous excuse for such a major error.

@RollaCola84

When you give the registration to get a car insurance quote it brings up the make and model of the car. Ditto when taxing a car. How on earth is it the dealerships fault ?

It could still be the same make and model car though, I accidentally put the wrong number plate in on a website when pricing something for my car but it still brought my actual cars make and model as there is another car out there with an almost identical number plate, it happens.

@Meloncurse

So the insurance you have is for a different registration to the one displayed on your car?

This happened to Dd. When she realised she phoned her insurers (Direct Line) in a panic. A very nice young man told her that her insurance was still valid, they do take account of human error. They did of course correct it on their records.

My daughter bought a second hand mini and the number plate didn't match the paperwork. Fortunately she noticed the following day. It was the dealership at fault.

This happened to us when we went to collect our sons new car a few years back . The number plate they had made up and attached was FCF and the car was actually CFC , I picked up on it as we were being shown around it before driving away . The dealership may have been originally at fault but surely you have to take responsibility if you’ve had it 3 years .

How did you not notice when you were renewing your insurance? It brings up your car on the systems?

@Soontobe60 Er yes you do.

This happened to us but with second hand car from a used dealer place. They took plates off so they could replace with new ones with name of the garage. Went to pick up the car, neither of us noticed. It only came to light when we needed a new part and had to give the reg plate in to the dealer to get the part. It was one letter out. Think it was about six months. We'd taken a pic of the car the day we picked it and sure enough that was the right reg number

I know of someone who had very similar where the two number plates were one digit different. It was 6 years old and make it through several MOTS.

It's an awful mistake to make

@BlueFairiesinthesky

Yes the insurance is for the registration number on the car, which is wrong. It is definitely the dealership’s fault not ours. They put the wrong number plate on the car.

That’s unlikely. The plate is the plate. It is the paperwork recording the plate number which is wrong.

The wrong number plate on the car also happened to me. I thought my memory was going as I couldn't seem to remember my number plate properly. Then realised (luckily after just a few days) that was because the one on the car and the one on my paperwork didn't match. It was off by one letter, and not obvious (something like E and F). I printed out and laminated the correct letter over the wrong one so I could drive it to the garage with the right number plate, but that just made it look it look extremely dodgy!

@Reallybadidea

They are essentially driving on fake plates. With insurance on those fake plates, not the real reg number.

But if the insurance matches the plates then how would the police have picked it up?

This. There would be no reason for the police to have noticed. Also, all insurance is useless unless you need to claim on it. You would have had to pay insurance whatever the reg number was

All the paperwork has the incorrect license plate number except for one paper, which we didn’t notice. It’s one letter difference. We should have noticed but we didn’t.

What is the one “paper” that has the correct number?

Is the incorrect number for the same make and model car? When I out in my reg number into insurer quote website, it asks me if make/model are correct.

The registration number on the V5C/Log book should be the correct one.

The license numbers (incorrect and correct) look VERY similar visually, so it’s not been picked up by the human eye.

I honestly do not understand how you could be driving around on the wrong plates for 3 years.

Not once did you check your documentation, or realise when renewing insurance/tax etc?

The dealership did initially mess up to start with but after 3 years it's really the owner's responsibility.

But when you put the details into the insurance it fills in the make, model and colour for you. Did those come up?

@Miniroofbox

What is the one “paper” that has the correct number?

It would have to be the V5C.

@Miniroofbox it’s the proof of ownership (V5C) paper which has the correct license number.

@SusieBob yep I’ve got no idea, we’ve got official insurance and DVLA tax in this time

So how did you not notice when you were putting the details in for the insurance?

We’ve also had two teams of service engineers looking at the paperwork and they haven’t noticed either

Well, you haven’t got official insurance have you.