Can I change my vehicles tax status?

Soldato
Joined
7 Aug 2004
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11,309
As title, I have a small Renault Kangoo van that I just use as a run around, but for some reason its classed as a 'light goods vehicle' and the road tax is an insane £320 a year for a 1.5D engine!!

I bought it from a car dealer 2nd hand, but as I have now bought it as my personal vehicle, can I change it to private vehicle/private light goods? I'm assuming this will drop the road tax?

I can't see much about it on the DVLA website, has anyone ever done this ?
 
Not sure complaining about it on here is going to help. :p

If you could, I'd imagine this would be a good starting place.

Failing that, maybe here.
 
Why? It's absolutely identical to any Renault kangoo, just has something different written on the log book what it was used for previously.

I don't understand the logic, it's no different engine wise.

Because you probably bought it tax (VAT) exempt or something.
 
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Not complaining I'm just trying to understand the logic here. I'll attempt to change it and see what happens.

As it is my little 5 seater kangoo which does 50mpg and is my car is nearly double the road tax of my van which does 30mpg.

Rules should be based on engine size. Should they not? Either way they get driven on the same roads.
 
It's still a commercial vehicle though?

Would it even be any cheaper - what year is the van?

A bit it special isn't he, it's still a van regardless of its used for. Why do you even have it if you don't need it, buy an estate car?
 
it's a goods vehicle, it doesn't matter what you bought it for. You can't go and buy a dumper truck and try and claim it's a car just because you personally don't want to move piles of earth around with it and just want to pop to the shops.

Say if you could change it to be taxed as a car, you then sell it to a builder who starts using it as a van and then it's incorrectly taxed again.
 
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You mention it's a 5 seater - did they even do a 5 seater 'van' version? I wouldn't have thought they were big enough to make that a sensible, sellable commercial vehicle.

Perhaps someone bought the car version and got its class changed to commercial so they could put it through a business? :p
 
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If it's a van then surely it doesn't have Windows in the back and so isn't identical?
It does have windows, all around, its a Renault Kangoo Maxi, 5 seats, rear seats fold down flat making the rear van like - but its not much bigger than a regular estate car, I just needed a slightly higher roof at the back to get more in.
You mention it's a 5 seater - did they even do a 5 seater 'van' version? I wouldn't have thought they were big enough to make that a sensible, sellable commercial vehicle.

Perhaps someone bought the car version and got its class changed to commercial so they could put it through a business? :p
Yes as mentioned above, its a 5 seater van, windows on all doors + rear barn doors, I wanted to be able to carry 5 people as per a regular car but also put the seats down, which on this model makes the floor flat like a regular Kangoo small car sized van
A 2006 car version is £365 a year to tax anyway, so would this even save any money?
This is the 2017 model, with much lower emissions - what makes no sense to me is my massive Renault Master van is a 2.3L 3 ton monster compared to this tiny little van and the tax for that is over a hundred quid less.
 
it's a goods vehicle, it doesn't matter what you bought it for. You can't go and buy a dumper truck and try and claim it's a car just because you personally don't want to move piles of earth around with it and just want to pop to the shops.

Say if you could change it to be taxed as a car, you then sell it to a builder who starts using it as a van and then it's incorrectly taxed again.

See my above post, its literally a tiny Renault Kangoo 5 seater, its basically the Kangoo version of an estate car - I just wanted a slightly higher rear roof the 'car sized van' shape allows for it.
 
Yes as mentioned above, its a 5 seater van, windows on all doors + rear barn doors, I wanted to be able to carry 5 people as per a regular car but also put the seats down, which on this model makes the floor flat like a regular Kangoo small car sized van

But was it actually ever sold as a commercial van in a 5 seater configuration with full windows? That sounds more like the consumer MPV version.
 
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Sounds like you've got the crew van version of the Kangoo by the sounds of it. That'll have the extra row of seats in the back and windows but it's still a van in the eyes of the DVLA, yes it shares almost everything with the regular consumer Kangoo MPV but it would have been sold as a commercial vehicle and i don't see any way of changing the tax on it.
 
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