driving

Buying a Left Hand Drive car in the UK

~ Kate Wilson ~ 2 Comments
I held back from telling this story until I had some news about how it ended.
But today I am very happy – overjoyed and relieved  – to announce that I am now the proud owner of a Seat Ibiza car bought in the UK, driven down through France and ……  almost two months
later …… today successfully put in my own name.  Here is our celebration breakfast

The UK part
I have been driving my VW van up and down to the UK for three years and it has been wonderful for camping and for carrying loads of wine and cheese north and boxes of books and china south.  But it was not possible to get my Catalan partner put onto the insurance (please don’t ask me why or tell me your best friend did this with no problem!  Every British insurance company I rang told me the same – to be insured you need to be resident or have a UK driving licence)  
Many people told me to pretend he is, or he does, but, that’s not the way for me.

This summer we had a problem.  I had tendinitis in my foot after driving 3500 miles from Granollers to Cornwall via Scotland.  We needed to get home to Granollers with our dog so I decided to leave the van in the UK and buy a left hand drive car from one of the specialist dealers in the UK. We could get Spanish insurance and share the driving.

I did a lot of research on the internet and chose a used car company specialising in this area. It had a good reputation and promised expertise so we took the train up country to test drive three cars. After much deliberation we ended up buying a Spanish registered Seat Ibiza.  It was a long day and stressful as these things always are.  But the car almost flew back down to Cornwall, was a dream to drive and it seemed meant to be – the registration plate had, almost, my date of birth as well as the festive letters FST.  It also had a full history and all necessary paperwork (ahem….slight cough)
We insured it with a Spanish company, fixed a little problem with the reverse lights and all was well.

Travel Home
A few weeks later we drove back up to Folkestone and went through the tunnel to Calais.
The best and most comfortable way for a dog to travel!
Down through France and over the border to Catalunya.  It was a great journey and without the camper van we had to stay in hotels – French hotels – oh la la, what a trial!

In Catalunya
Back in Granollers, we made an appointment with the official office for changing ownership of cars. This is called the Jefatura de Trafico and is run by the Spanish Government.
If you are thinking this will be as easy a process as in the UK then put that out of your head now.
This is Spain/Catalunya and there is bureaucracy.
For a start you need to go in person.
You need paperwork and lots of it. 
In our area you must go to either Barcelona or Sabadell and join the queues.

The Bad News
We had already had an inkling of it on the phone when the women at the Trafico drew in breath sharply on hearing the registration number saying  ‘there is a problem with this car‘
I managed to put this to the back of my mind but when we actually arrived at the office the problem turned out to be several problems and here they are:-
1. There was still a debt attached to the car from the original purchase
2. There were two years of Road tax unpaid which would fall to me
3. The Biggie!   The car was registered in the name of a Mallorcan business and not in the name of the previous owner individually.   This meant that more papers were needed and nothing that we had been given by the car dealers was adequate.  We needed papers to show the seller was an appointed representative of the Mallorcan business. We needed papers from the bank to show the original debt had been paid and had been anulled. We needed a proper bill from the Mallorcan business to show they had sold the car to me. 

Lots of papers and some of them seemed hard to imagine being able to find.  Especially as the Mallorcan business had not really sold the car to me. They sold it to a car dealer in the UK. 

Patience. Perseverance. Positive thinking
I am not going to go over all that we had to do in the next two months. There were emails and letters (some going astray of course) and phone calls and sleepless nights.  I couldn’t have done it alone as the bureaucracy overwhelmed me in its complications.  The car dealers in the UK did help to get  the correct papers from the previous owner but we did most of the leg work at our end.  I worried that the dealers were slow to act at the beginning and that they never once apologised or took responsibility for the problem or promised to take the car back if things couldn’t be sorted out.  I also worried that these problems had already put off previous buyers, more savvy than us, perhaps we had been diddled?  Paranoia crept in.
Thanks to the Citizens Advice Service in the UK (reachable by phone and offering excellent advice on their web site as well), I at least knew the law was on my side and I sent off an official letter laying out what I wanted and giving a deadline. 
Time is of the essence was the key phrase.
If the deadline was not met then I would expect them to come and collect the car and return my money. 


That deadline is tomorrow and I am very happy to say today we were successful on our second trip to Sabadell accompanied by a file about three inches thick with paperwork.

The car is now in my name and all that remains is to get the money for the fines and taxes back from the UK car dealers – they have agreed to do so, not offered mind, but agreed.

 In Conclusion
All’s well that ends well and I have learned that paperwork in Spain can be a nightmare to deal with but, given time and patience, and support,  it can be done.

However, I would not recommend buying a LHD car in the UK unless you are very confident and knowledgeable about the law and the rules for buying and selling a car in Spain.  If you are prepared for unforeseen difficulties, are not afraid of standing up for your customer rights and have a strong stomach for stress then perhaps it can be worth it but otherwise, buy a car in Spain and allow the dealers to sort out all the paperwork.

Keypoints if you do decide to buy in the UK

  1. Buy from a recommended dealer, a specialist in LHD.  They ought to know what paperwork is necessary and are duty bound to provide it
  2. Make sure the car documents are in the name of an individual. You will get photocopies of their identity cards or passports. Make sure they are up to date!
  3. Check on the internet if there are any outstanding fines on the car. Don’t just rely on the dealer
  4. Get a certificate of compraventa signed by the previous owner. 
  5. Don’t (like we did ) accept a car with only a month left on its ITV (like MOT)  If there are problems with changing the ownership of the car then you may be left for a while with a car that you can’t drive around.  At least get a sizeable price reduction if this is unavoidable.
  6. Check the Impost de Circulacion (Road Tax) is up to date and if not, get a reduction in price
  7. Pay with a credit card to further protect yourself.

Saturday night much needed Vermut

~ Kate Wilson ~ 1 Comment

As Fly Lady says, ‘you are not behind, just start from where you are’   So……

I’ve just had a friend to stay with me here in Granollers who I haven’t seen for two, or is it three years?  We had one of those wonderful weeks where there is plenty of time to catch up with everything but not in one great gulp.  We let the conversation meander between memories of when we were 6 and first met, to recent life changes, to current concerns, to music, back to families, stories from when we were teenagers, drugs, books and poems, kittens and dogs and everything else in between.

I’ll try to do the same thing now with you, letting the subjects rise and fall in their own rhythm.

Diet
I gave up my fasting diet for the week and ate and drank solidly throughout. It was lovely but now I’ll be returning with pleasure to the 5/2 diet where for 2 days a week you reduce your calories and feel hungry for a change. I’m pushing myself to get fully into kilos and grams and let go of pounds and ounces in more ways than one!

The Foot
Every morning this week I cycled to The Mútua for physiotherapy on my foot.
The journey up through France and north to Scotland then back down again caused a repetitive strain tendinitis in my left ankle.
I now know that this is a common injury and could have been avoided if I had rested more.   It didn’t start hurting until it was too late and by then I still had to drive and walk so compounded the problem.  For two months now it has been hard to walk, not helped by my impatience to take Bonnie out so that as soon it gets better I overdo it again.
I am having Laser and Ultrasound and Tens daily. It’s a sort of DIY system in the clinic where you clean the equipment and get your own ice-packs thus freeing up the staff to spend more time chatting with each other at reception

Art at Last
My friend Christine and I went to an art class in Granollers this week. It is amazing and is exactly what I have been looking for since I arrived but before I could only find classes for children.
We practised mixing colours in acryic paints which was like a meditation and totally absorbing

 I’ve always ended up before with mud brown and now I know why.
For days afterwards we were ‘seeing’ colours all around us. Look at this street corner in Granollers

Did you know that Malva is the Spanish word for Mauve?   And the Malvinas?

Now to get to the biggest theme of the week. The car.
In brief (which is difficult to do when something is obsessively churning around in your head) I bought a left hand drive Spanish registered car when I was in the UK. We drove home in it which meant that I could rest my ******* ankle.  It is a lovely car but when we went to Sabadell to register ourselves as the new owners, we couldn’t. We don’t have the correct paperwork from the UK dealers.
This is Spain. You need the correct papers and lots of them.  It is all a terrible muddle and errhhhh!
It has driven me crazy these past two weeks.  Very luckily we were able to get it through the ITV which is nothing to do with television but is the Spanish equivalent of the MOT.   You don’t need  to be the owner at the test.  The car is insured but that is it –  we don’t legally own it, there are several outstanding debts on it, we are not able to pay the road tax as we are not the owners…….. and the phone calls to the dealers are no fun.  I’m sure there will be a follow up to this saga….

That’s it for now then. If you are interested in seeing lovely photos of our town then can I invite you to take a look at the Facebook page Aboutgranollers?   I am building up a collection of images about what was called in the Guardian, this nondescript Catalan town.
And a last picture from today’s walk/limp in Montnegre. These are the trees that give us cork – they look so naked and unprotected after their outer bark has been taken. Think of them when you next open a bottle of wine.  But meanwhile, Salut and have a happy weekend wherever you are.

RACC and ruin

~ Kate Wilson ~ 2 Comments

The weekend came to a sudden end as the van starter motor problem reappeared this morning. I was on my way to pick up Pep at the railway station, running late after a very disturbed night with Bonnie having stomach problems! Thank goodness I hadn’t had to make a dash to the vet in the middle of the night.  I had written down, just in case, the number of a 24hour service in Figueres.  She was stretching and bowing all night and needing to pop outside on a regular basis but I resisted panicking.

Lack of sleep meant I was already late when I turned the ignition switch and –  nothing. That is what happens when the starter motor is stuck. No coughing or spluttering or weak attempts to get going. Just nothing. It happened about a month ago and the mechanic hit it with a hammer, got it going and said it either would happen again, or it wouldn’t!

Helen and Francis were helpful as ever and I got a lift to Figueres and back. Then, instead of going to Port Lligat to visit Dalis house, and instead of having lunch by the sea, we spent the morning trying to sort it out.  As usual, my foreigner status made this more complicated than is necessary

  • Car insurance here includes rescue and recovery.  My insurance is British and doesn’t
  • Garages are closed on Saturdays. We didn’t know any local friendly mechanics.
  • RACC is the Catalan equivalent of the AA and although they work on weekends, their membership office doesn’t so I couldn’t join up.
  • The local rescue and recovery wasn’t keen on coming out as he usually gets paid through insurance and what if he couldn’t get the van started – would we pay up?

But he did come and he did start it. Turned out he was the local RACC man anyway!
The only problem was that then we couldn’t turn the engine off as the starter motor was still stuck.

So we all drove home although Bonnie and I had planned to stay till Monday.  At least we are close to a local mechanic who hopefully can sort it out on Monday.  And I hope I can join the RACC even though my van and insurance and documents are British. 
Bonnie by the way seems better. If she wants to go out in the night here, it means putting on my clothes so I am very glad to see her sleeping peacefully now.

Novullpagar

~ Kate Wilson ~ 3 Comments

Excuse me using a Catalan title in Castellano week but it felt important to write about the May Day protest at the highway toll booths yesterday.
The campaign is called Novullpagar and means I don’t want to pay.

What’s it about?  Why are Catalan people so angry about paying charges on the motorways?

The highways are owned by the central government in Madrid but are managed by private companies.  You would think that the rules would be the same all over Spain but this is not the case. Travel out of Catalunya and you can drive along wonderful stretches of well maintained motorways. You can zoom along for free,
We noticed this on the way to Almeria recently.
But in Catalunya, there are toll booths and you have to pay.
Around Madrid the vast majority of the motorways are free.
Around Barcelona and Valancia – you pay through the nose.
And now….the central government in Madrid has decided to make ALL the roads around Madrid free.
At the same time they have given the highway companies more powers to charge in Catalunya.
So wouldn’t you feel aggrieved?
Imagine if David Cameron decided to charge on all the motorways in Scotland and Wales but to keep the ones in England free!
May Day was the biggest protest of not paying. They allowed the cars through in the end but took their registration numbers. 
We will see what happens next.

Driving the Van

~ Kate Wilson ~ 3 Comments

The van now has its new glass fitted – I found the insurance will pay at least half the cost – and I now have only to keep it safe from further attacks until I drive to Cornwall via Santander in a week or so It’s a long drive from here to the port and I am not thinking about it too much given my anxiety about driving in Catalunya. A friend is coming to visit from Cornwall and will keep me company on the trip.
When we went to France/Catalunya Nord I felt myself relax as soon as we crossed the border. For some reason it is easier (for me) driving in France. There are less cars, people drive fast but they keep a safe distance from your rear bumper and the roads somehow feel wider and more friendly. Around here it is impossible to go anywhere without having to negotiate endless busy intersections and fast carreteras. If you leave a good braking distance between you and the car in front, someone else will immediately overtake you and fill it up. People only slow down for the radars and clearly think that the brakes are there for using hard, fast and often. I drove for years in London and have no fear of driving alone from Cornwall to Glasgow but for some reason the traffic here has turned me into a rabbit!
There was a car glass replacement centre right on our street which was handy! And less traumatic for my nerves.Perhaps the answer if to drive more – I must try the trip to Barcelona, and as a priority I need to go somewhere all by myself……the supermarket is fairly close and I will set this as a goal before I leave for Cornwall. Will report back here!