Renew your EV Road Tax

[RedMod3]

Can I suggest that we all renew our Road Tax today,

Tax your vehicle

Renew or tax your vehicle for the first time using a reminder letter, your log book or the green 'new keeper' slip - and how to tax if you do not have any documents

www.gov.uk

If you do this, you can renew at £0 in March next year, just before the tax rises on 1 April 2025.

 

[Wybrook]

My “bill” arrived last month. I’ve never paid any “tax” so quickly!

 

[Jason71]

Can I suggest that we all renew our Road Tax today,

Tax your vehicle

Renew or tax your vehicle for the first time using a reminder letter, your log book or the green 'new keeper' slip - and how to tax if you do not have any documents

www.gov.uk

If you do this, you can renew at £0 in March next year, just before the tax rises on 1 April 2025.

If you tax now the new licence will end on February28th 2025 so you will actually need to renew it in February next year. If you renew it IN March you will be without a licence for the beginning of March and it does not really gain you anything you can just do it in March 2025 with exactly the same outcome.

There may in fact there may be a way to get an extra month. If you renew in April this year then your licence will expire on March 31st 2025. When the Govt implement these types of changes there are two possible ways they do it
1) for all licences bought on or after 1st April
2) for all licences starting on or after the 1st of April

And if they do option two it may not actually be in place by the first of March anyway so if your licence is due to start 1st of April 2025 you can possibly renew it at the start of March 2025 and get Free tax up until 1st of April 2025 rather than 1st of March which will be the outcome with your suggestion.

There is no risk involved because in the event that it is in place on March 1st and is for licences starting on or after April 1st you can just SORN the car for a few hours then tax it from March 1st anyway. depends how much trouble you want to go to to save an extra month/£15.

 

[MrT3]

it does not really gain you anything you can just do it in March 2025 with exactly the same outcome.

Unless the rules get changed to stop people delaying the tax increase.

 

[Jason71]

Unless the rules get changed to stop people delaying the tax increase.

True but unlikely. It would be pretty tricky to do and probably require a change in the law. The cost of doing it would out weight any benefit. One month of extra tax on a few EV's would not even cover the software development costs.

 

[Js1977]

True but unlikely. It would be pretty tricky to do and probably require a change in the law. The cost of doing it would out weight any benefit. One month of extra tax on a few EV's would not even cover the software development costs.

I could be wrong but I think that what @MrT3 meant was dodging at least 11 months... That is allot of cash....

Hav ing said that, I dont think they would do it and instead let us think we had the last laugh when this is the first time AFAIK that they retrospectively slapped the road tax/VED.

 

[spdpsba]

So what do we do now? Renew now or wait till end of March?

 

[RedMod3]

I renewed in March, so I have to renew for 1 March 2025; if I renew in April, it will need to be renewed from 1 April from which tax on our Teslas will be payable.

My VED was not due until Sep 24, but I renewed early at £0

 

[GeorgeSymonds]

So what do we do now? Renew now or wait till end of March?

They only work in whole months, so any time in March will be the same.

 

[GeorgeSymonds]

I could be wrong but I think that what @MrT3 meant was dodging at least 11 months... That is allot of cash....

Hav ing said that, I dont think they would do it and instead let us think we had the last laugh when this is the first time AFAIK that they retrospectively slapped the road tax/VED.

The saving is £15 per month and the total depending when your renewal is. If your tax is due Feb, you save 1 month/£15 but not until Feb 2026, Jan it’s £30, Dec £45 etc,

A similar thing happened in about 2017 and the same trick was used if I remember correctly, and I recall Tesla were even registering new cars whilst still on the boat to avoid the tax which was probably pushing things a bit too far.

 

[Jason71]

I could be wrong but I think that what @MrT3 meant was dodging at least 11 months... That is allot of cash....

Hav ing said that, I dont think they would do it and instead let us think we had the last laugh when this is the first time AFAIK that they retrospectively slapped the road tax/VED.

well its only 11 months if your current VED is due in April. Mine is September so doing this would save me 6 months. All I was saying is that with a bit more work it may be possible make it 7months ( in my case)

 

[BushtrimmmerJr]

Hi all, sorry if I’m being a bit thick here. We picked up our current M3 in June/July last year and normally just tax each year as normal. Am I correct in thinking I can tax it early now at £0 meaning I then save/defer the VED/Tax until March 2025? Do I need to SORN it for two mins and then tax it again?

 

[Jason71]

I renewed in March, so I have to renew for 1 March 2025; if I renew in April, it will need to be renewed from 1 April from which tax on our Teslas will be payable.

My VED was not due until Sep 24, but I renewed early at £0

You say that but it is unclear if the law kicks in on the 1st of April or vehicles taxed from the 1st of April (during March) DVLA have taken both approaches in the past and the wording on the govt site is ambiguous:

it says From the 1st of April so if you tax in March FOR the 1st of April are you OK? it also says 2025-26 financial year which does not even start until April 6th
so who knows. As I said history is no guide DVLA has taken both approaches in the past.

 

[Jason71]

Hi all, sorry if I’m being a bit thick here. We picked up our current M3 in June/July last year and normally just tax each year as normal. Am I correct in thinking I can tax it early now at £0 meaning I then save/defer the VED/Tax until March 2025? Do I need to SORN it for two mins and then tax it again?

correct. You can re-tax any time you like. Taxing during March 2025 will mean instead of having to re-tax in June 2025 you will not have to do it until February 2026 (for the 1st of March 2026) There by saving you about £15 per month times about 9 months in your case.
If you want to tax now so that the renewal happens automatically for March1st 2025 (in case you forget next year) then you can but there is no real urgency it can be done next year just the same.

 

[Pink Duck]

My vehicle excise licence letter arrived with only an option for 12 months. I did mine online before that using V5C document reference (available from 5th day of the month to commence the next). So should be able to do so again after 5th March 2025, ahead of 1st April 2025 rate change, before the 2025–26 fiscal year. Doing so earlier to run March 2025→Feb 2026 doesn’t really gain anything.

 

[The_Kilt]

this section of the explaination of the change seems to imply that EVs registered between 1st April 2027 and 1st April 2018 will pay the £10 tax rater, and after April 208 will pay the standard annual rate? taken from here: (Introduction of Vehicle Excise Duty for zero emission cars, vans and motorcycles from 2025)

"Zero emission cars first registered on or after 1 April 2017 will be liable to pay the lowest first year rate of VED which currently applies to vehicles with CO2 emissions 1 to 50g/km. From the second year of registration onwards, zero emission cars will move to the standard annual rate."

 

[yessuz]

so for example, my taxation letter is in January

so can anyone explain the process for a five grader?

1. I get my letter in January 2025.
2. tax it for free in January 2025
3. Tax it again in March 2025

Do I need to SORN it before re-tax it in March? or what should I do? what is the process?

 

[Js1977]

Just tax it again this month and forget about it for now. No need to sorn.

 

[Pink Duck]

Could also tax it from 5th April 2024 to get April to March at zero rate for more benefit.

As renewing existing vehicle tax in financial year 2025–26 will be at the new higher rate.

The question is whether renewing online from 5th March 2025 means paying the 1st April rate for April–March. If so, renewing before 5th March 2025 should give optimal length of zero-rate (for March 2025–Feb 2026).

 

[GlynG]

My tax is due end of this month, I re-taxed it using the reminder online, The confirmation confirms my tax starts from 1st April, so perhaps the way to do it is not use the reminder letter? - and tax it as if a newly acquired vehicle.

For me, i think i will SORN my car in March next year - then a few days later tax it again - seems to be the only way at the moment, unless others know differently?