stevenuk300

Exactly what the title says, what would I expect to be told from one of these checks?

dnb

-How many owners the car has had
-how many plates the car has had
-whether it has been written off before (and registered as such - IE an insurance loss)
-whether it's been stolen (requires due dilligence from YOU to check the VIN numbers etc before you buy for their insurance)
- whether the current MOT is legal
- whether there is outstanding finance on the car

Loads of things - well worth doing if it's an expensive car - mine turned up 6 plate changes in 6 years!!! (but only 3 owners) It causes the Subaru garage a headache whenever they try to find me parts with the reg no!

stevenuk300

Will it list all accidents the car has been involved in, or just if the car has been a write off?
How much does this cost to get done?

Cheers
Steven

Dracoro

Worth doing whatever the price of the car. I'd never buy a car without doing one. I'd go so far to say you are a bit silly not to do a check, especially given that 1/3rd of all used cars have hidden history (crashed, nicked, on finance etc.). It may be minor and go ahead and buy if the issues are resolved(i.e. crashed and fixed etc.) but it WILL affect the resale value so you'll lose out when you sell it as most prospective buyers will do the HPI that you didn't.

If it ends up being nicked or on finance you may lose the car. Doesn't matter whether that's £1000 or £30000, you lose the cash.

Hey, it's only £40 and gives you peace of mind. you've too much to lose not to.


Having said all this, I'm sometimes amazed to hear that there are many people that buy a car without the V5 docs! There are some stupid people out there! don't be one of them!

dnb

It won't list the accidents - only a recorded writeoff (and when it happened). If you think about it, then a "fender bender" would likely be sorted out with cash to save everyones NCB. It's back to the old panel gap and overspray checks there!

It cost me £30ish for my Scoob. Well worth it for the peace of mind.

stevenuk300

Thanks for the advice.

GaryCat

CarWatchUK do an online history check for only £9.99 and it included all the info that a more expensive check did.

Gary.

BOB.T

One of the lads at work did one on my car, just for a laugh, turns out, on paper it's had a colour change! In actual fact the garage I bought it off thought it was black but it is actually very dark blue so they'd just filled the forms out wrong