False Registration – Again

Back in 2022 (so before I moved) I received a car’s V5C registration document that wasn’t for me – not in my name, and not a vehicle I’d every owned, or even seen.  It also wasn’t a name I knew, and not a plate I recognised.

It turned out that this is a known scam, where the owner of the vehicle is basically going to try not paying for parking/speeding fines and fees. It’s odd, because it relies on people being useless and just throwing the V5C away – which is *not* a good plan.

Instead, take a copy of the V5C (either a scan, or photos will be fine) and then return the V5C to DVLA – their contact details are here – with a covering note explaining that the person and vehicle mentioned have never lived here and that the vehicle doesn’t belong here.  Send that ASAP.

Anyway, a few weeks back, the same happened again – a different name and registration, but the same scam. So I did the same again, scanned it and sent it back with the covering letter.

And a week later I started getting parking penalty notices – all in the name of the V5C person, and relating to that vehicle.  I’ve returned a couple, and kept a couple – because at some point I’m sure it’s going to end up with a visit.

Thankfully, this week I got the confirmation letter back from DVLA that they’ve accepted that the registration is flawed/faked, and they’ve taken my address off the record for that vehicle.  (I’m keeping that letter safe, obviously!)

I don’t know if the parking penalty people will re-check for reigstered addresses etc., so I’m still sort-of expecting a knock on the door. But I’ve got all the defenses I can think of on that score, so at least it’ll be interesting!


Driving Change – One Year On

One year ago today, I finally got my new (to me) car delivered.  The farce that surrounded that whole purchase was a nightmare – and it gave me great joy to see that Cazoo collapsed fairly soon afterwards (although I wasn’t responsible for that)

Thankfully though, the car itself has turned out to be a bit of a gem.  I got it with 16,000 miles on the clock, and it’s now on 41,000. (Yes, I remain a daft bastard who drives *way* too much!)

I was nervous when I first got it – it’s a ’16 plate, so that mileage was exceptionally low, and I did wonder whether it would be a bit seized from being massively underused.  But right from the delivery day – where I took it out for a 60-mile motorway round-trip just to make sure it was OK – it’s been fine.  It seemed to say “Oh, this is a better setup!“, and settled happily into being a high-mileage car .

It’s had two services (20 and 40,000 miles, as recommended by the handbook) and the MoT, and everything’s been fine, which is exactly what I was hoping for.

All told, very happy with the entire thing. Let’s hope it does me well for a few more years!


Ongoing Unwellitude

Thankfully it’s not been non-stop Unwell, but everything’s taken a long time to finally start sodding off.

I was doing OK at the time of the last post, although the cough hadn’t quite Fucked Off yet. That stuck around for the next couple of weeks – not entirely surprisingly, as I was (against advice) busy and doing stuff, and not giving my body a lot of time off.

Then last weekend (the 8/9th of June, if anyone’s counting) I did a day-trip to Manchester (see above about not giving myself time off) for a restaurant visit. (Which was excellent, and well worth the trip)   My table companion had been doing a lot of air travel and so on, and also had a similar cough to me.

I *think* that what happened there was that I picked up a second blast of what had already hit me. Or, if not the exact same thing, then at least bloody close to it, but different enough to get past any already-set-up immunity.

So this week was a kind of return to how I was a few weeks back. It didn’t mess me up *as* much, but still left me with a couple of very rough days.

It seems to be back in abeyance now, and hopefully that’ll also mean that this dry cough has a chance to piss off as well. We’ll see.


MoT Day

Well, today’s the day of the new (to me) car’s MoT, so it’ll be interesting to see what happens.  Let’s hope it just cruises through.

[Updated : It passed, no problems and one minor advisory]


Literal vs Lateral

One thing I’ve found fascinating with people – both where I live now, and previous places – is how literal they are, even when it means they take longer to do things.

For example, where I now live there are several junctions where turning right onto a busy road can mean significant delays for people.  But most of those junctions also have roundabouts a short distance up the road if people instead turned left.

So here, for example – the scenario is that I’m pulling out of the Stephenson industrial estate, wanting to turn right.

If I turn left, it’s 400m to the roundabout. It’s a simple thing, an 800m round-trip, and far faster than the delay when waiting to turn right. But no-one does it. They’re so locked into “I’m turning right” that they somehow don’t even think about turning left instead.

On another regular drive, in the run-up to another roundabout, the left-hand lane gets utterly jammed, waiting for a safe gap in which to get out and turn left.  But if one takes the right-hand lane, it’s all too easy to get up to the front, go all the way round the roundabout and then come off to that same route – well before the equivalent drivers in the left-hand lane have caught up.  Yes, it’s effectively a 450° turn, but it’s *so* much quicker.  And again, people are locked into “I’m turning left” and seem to not see the alternative at all.

It’s all very odd.  I mean, I’m glad I can look at it and see those lateral decisions that make life easier, but I do find it fascinating that so many people simply can’t/don’t do so.


Car Progress

Somehow I’ve already had the new (to me) car for three full months, and thankfully it’s turned out to be a good buy.

I had my concerns – for a car registered in 2016, a mileage of 18,000 is gobsmackingly low, so I did wonder if it had spent a lot of its time in garages or whatever, but it seems that the previous owner just didn’t get out much.  Obviously that is not the case with me, so that mileage has already increased by a third. (6,000 miles in three months – yeah, that’s about standard for me)

It’s proved to be an absolute beast on the motorway, and just handles all the miles I’ve thrown at it so far.  It’s weirdly quiet in general – which isn’t a complaint, just an observation that a diesel vehicle still doesn’t feel like it’s meant to be that quiet! It’s also sitting happily at an indicated 49Mpg. I’d be happy if that were slightly better, but it’s a decent enough figure for my purposes.

It’s also meant that I’ll be able to split the costs of MOT / Servicing and Tax / Insurance Renewal – I got it with about six months MOT left, so that’ll be due in April, and Insurance etc. isn’t til November/December, which is definitely nicer than having Everything Due All At Once.

There are niggles – primarily it turns out that what I’ve got is a 2015 model that was registered at the start of 2016, so it’s just missed out on having better tech integration (no Apple CarPlay, for example) although I can – and will – fix that with some form of aftermarket sortout.  On the positives though, it means I also don’t have driver “aids” like auto start/stop , or the lane-change-warning stuff (that tried to kill me last time I had it on an Insignia) which is all fine with me.

All told, it’s worked out well.


Key Information

When I got the new (to me) car it only had one key – although it had two fobs, it was just that the actual keyblade on one of them was missing. (Which is quite an achievement in the first place!)

I like having two working keys for the car – it means, among other things, that I can leave it with people (valets, MoT/Servicing etc.) without leaving my full bunch of house keys as well.

So I asked at the local dealership what the price would be for a replacement, and they quoted an OK-but-high price for it, saying it might take a couple of days from ordering in order to get the right one – oh, and have the V5 registration certificate as proof of ownership. And then didn’t get round to it.

This week though, I did a quick trip to my local(ish) Tesco that I know has a Timpson concession/branch at it. And (being organised, for once) I remembered to take the spare key fob with me.  Nothing to lose by asking, and all that jazz.

So I asked, and got it done for £50 (less than a sixth of what the dealership had quoted) in less than fifteen minutes.

I’ve always been impressed by Timpsons (among other things, I like that they are open to employing ex-convicts and so on, opening doors that many places close) and I’m glad that I took the time to use them for this one.