Sticky insurance situation France.. advice on penalties pls

[tameliontamer]

I'm looking for a bit of guidance on French motoring law... Eek.

While on holiday my car broke down in France. I managed to move it away from main roads and parked it in a very secluded part of a rural area, and travelled back to the UK without it.

My intention was to sell the car for spare parts on eBay because it's old. So I didn't renew the insurance (foolishly), and it has completely elapsed even in the UK. But then my eBay listing came to nothing - so I was a bit undecided about how to actually get rid of it.

Now I've received a letter by special delivery to my house in the UK from the French authorities saying it's exceeded the parking limit of one week and been impounded...

The car is 13 years old and I reckon it's worth £200-£400 at best. For a young hobbyist it's driveable, and there's value in the parts etc. It passed its MOT last time but there is a lot of wear and tear. But obviously it's a British car so it would drive on the wrong side of the road.

The authorities are asking for payment of release fees and display of insurance policy to release it, but they've not said what the payment total would be.

My options are:

1. Ignore the letter completely. The letter says it will be scrapped after one month from the letter, which I am not too bothered about. What can they do if I don't make contact? They know my address in the UK (via British authorities I expect). Are the French authorities able to recover the money somehow, or nab me when I next travel to France? I would actually like to visit again!

2. Contact the authorities and request they dispose of the car out there, explain the situation, and hope for the best.

3. Contact them and pay for it to be released (no idea what total amount), pay for some insurance (and hope that this is acceptable, given there's been a gap) and try to find a breakers' yard to collect it and buy it.

What is the likely penalty? In the event of 2 or 3 is it worth explaining the back story - it's only been parked in an off-the-beaten track area, not driven at all - or is that irrelevant?

My priority is to get rid of the car and keep costs down. There doesn't seem to be any point in travelling out there to deal with this, so I'd be trying to do it remotely from the UK.

Please let me know if you have any strong advice on this. Thanks!

[smifffymoto]

I would contact them and tell them to crush it.They will check all the numbers and most probably crush it and reycle the metal.You won’t be able to do it because it is not French registered.
The costs of release and insurance etc will be alot more than your loss( I guess).

[leyorkie]

Do you need some sort of certificate of scrappage to get the DVLA to accept it’s gone so not subject to tax and insurance.

[magooagain]

Last time I scrapped a uk car in France it was easy enough,they didn't care about a log book etc and payed me up with a cheque. There are loads of UK cars being disposed of here in the Charente region.

My advice is let them crush it and deal with anything else if it happens,which I doubt.

[tameliontamer]

Thanks all, that is highly useful. I think DVLA do require some sort of proof in order to make the vehicle as exported.

I'll contact the French authorities and see what happens. There are no contact details on their letter (no email, no phone, etc) so it'll have to be a special delivery of my letter.

[kiethton]

Not strictly the letter of the law but I’d be tempted to just fill out the V5 to a fake trader/person and post it off, back-dated to a few days after the breakdown.

I’d then ignore the french and accept the car was done and gone. By far the easiest course of action.