Cost of MOT (UK WOF) to soar

[Bob]

The motorcycle MOT (I believe this is the same as your WOF, a certification to show that the bike is fit for road use) fee is set to increase by more than 50% from £15.55 to £23.80 (approx NZD 63), following lobbying from the Retail Motor Industry Federation (RMI) to ‘bring the cost in proportion with the time it actually takes to perform’.

A new examination of test times has shown that the time required to run a full MOT test has gone up from 24 minutes in 2000 to 37 minutes following the introduction of extra items.

VOSA, who set the fees, has also proposed an increase the duplicate motorcycle test certificate fee to £10 to ‘correct the previous disparity with the car certificate fee’ as a result of RMI lobbying.

The revised fees are intended to be introduced on Monday 1 August 2005.

[betti]

nowt fresh there then, Sorn payments, mot increases, you wanna move to Nz mate :msn-wink:

[Motu]

They must have ''price fixing'' in the UK....that was a dumb move here,now customers drive around all day finding a ''cheap'' WoF.

I was on a WoF course a couple of weeks ago and we did a ''what do you charge'' around the table,the idiot next to me was doing them for $30,we all laughed at him.The instuctor shook his head at us in dispare...''you need to be charging at least an hour of labour because that's how long it takes in real time,plus you have to pay for your computer time,stationary,this course will cost you $150 and your yearly revue of $600'' - and we still do them for a loss because the guys up the road do them cheaper,what idiots we are! At $90 for a car WoF we could maybe have a 10% profit margin,and who the hell works on 10% these days? Half that for a bike...$45.

[bugjuice]

one thing about MOTs tho, you only have them once a year, where as WOFs here are every 6 months, so 2 x our cost is somewhere = to MOT cost..
New vehicles get a year WOF, but I don't know if that turns to 6 months or stays a year for a while. I'll let you know when my bike one runs out.
And in the UK, do new vehicles still not need an MOT for the first 3 years?

When I lived in the UK, I don't think out of the 8 cars I went thru, I never got any MOT'd.. And I never wrote any off so that I had to buy another..

[Motu]

But they have compulsory 3rd party.My brother in Canada has to pay $1800 a year to ride his bike for 6mths of the year,kinda expensive with 2 bikes.I get sick of people bleating about how much it costs to run a car or bike in NZ,it's bloody cheap compared to the rest of the world!

[bugjuice]

But they have compulsory 3rd party.My brother in Canada has to pay $1800 a year to ride his bike for 6mths of the year,kinda expensive with 2 bikes.I get sick of people bleating about how much it costs to run a car or bike in NZ,it's bloody cheap compared to the rest of the world!
with ya all the way there..
altho it has it's upside. You get some twat in a sup'd up car run into you, then run off..

[Bob]

Yup, brand new vehicles are exempt from MOT for the first three years. MOT is annually after that. And if the vehicle fails, then the retest (there is a time limit, think two or three weeks) is free.

The MOT is a fixed price, no matter where you go.

And we do have compulsory 3rd party insurance. Which to be honest is pretty cheap (benefit of currently heading back into a competitive UK vehicle insurance marketplace). And if you're only riding 6 months of the year, you just take out a six-month policy. Works out more expensive pro-rata though.

That said, I'd never want less than TPF&T (Third Party, Fire & Theft) cover. Ideally, I'd have fully comp, but that ain't cheap (stick another £100 - around NZD 265) on top of the bill and that's a rough rule of thumb - unless you're my wife, who for some reason we really can't work out finds it is cheaper for her to insure her XV250 fully comp than anything else!

[Ixion]

..! At $90 for a car WoF we could maybe have a 10% profit margin,and who the hell works on 10% these days? Half that for a bike...$45.

Yes, but a WOF often brings other work with it. Either for the stuff found during the WOF , or because a lot of people (like me ) "save up" services and non-urgent maintainance and get it all done along with the WOF.

[XTC]

Jeez bob 23.80 for a mot.... Next they'll want you to fit mirrors to your bikes....:)

[Lou Girardin]

Yes, but a WOF often brings other work with it. Either for the stuff found during the WOF , or because a lot of people (like me ) "save up" services and non-urgent maintainance and get it all done along with the WOF.

It's called a "loss leader" in retail. $30 for the 20 min WOF's I've had seem about right.

[Motu]

Yes, but a WOF often brings other work with it. Either for the stuff found during the WOF , or because a lot of people (like me ) "save up" services and non-urgent maintainance and get it all done along with the WOF.
IF you get the work - one place I worked at we got 90% of our rejects,here I only do 10% of my rejects,they do the repairs themselves or find someone ''cheaper'' - like yesterday,I failed a car on no handbrake,we pulled the drums off and said he needed his drums machined and shoes reradiused,and he paid for that...he came back 3 times (three road tests for me,for free) I don't know what the Chinese guy who works in his back yard around the corner did,but I bet he spent more time,but less money than we would doing a proper job.No,it doesn't bring in extra work,but we try and train our customers to service their car at the same time as a WoF...good for both of us.

[bear]

IF you get the work - one place I worked at we got 90% of our rejects,here I only do 10% of my rejects,they do the repairs themselves or find someone ''cheaper'' - like yesterday,I failed a car on no handbrake,we pulled the drums off and said he needed his drums machined and shoes reradiused,and he paid for that...he came back 3 times (three road tests for me,for free) I don't know what the Chinese guy who works in his back yard around the corner did,but I bet he spent more time,but less money than we would doing a proper job.No,it doesn't bring in extra work,but we try and train our customers to service their car at the same time as a WoF...good for both of us.

Few years back had a car and took it back for a few WOF re-tests until sorted everything out. The fella did the first re-check for free, but after that was charging me. A little while ago now, but I think it was $5 or $10.

[Ixion]

IF you get the work - one place I worked at we got 90% of our rejects,here I only do 10% of my rejects,they do the repairs themselves or find someone ''cheaper'' -..


By and large, I couldn't be bothered with that. I just want to take the vehicle to a shop and tell them lube, service, wof, anything needs doing for the wof, take care of it. And then pick it up later all taken care of . Getting old and lazy I guess. But I suspect that most of the people who go off to find someone cheaper end up paying pretty much the same and wasting a lot of time on it. And if you're going to do it yourself, testing station is the way to go (and, really, it shouldn't fail, because if you're capable of fixing it, you're capable of knowing it needs fixing and doing it *before* you go for the warrent)

[Motu]

Few years back had a car and took it back for a few WOF re-tests until sorted everything out. The fella did the first re-check for free, but after that was charging me. A little while ago now, but I think it was $5 or $10.
It's illeagal to charge for a recheck,unless extra work is done.The trade has been spewing about this one for years,but the LTSA won't budge - good to see someone taking the law into their own hands.