Is It Worth Checking Your Vehicle’s History?

When you’re buying a car from a private seller, it’s easy to trust the seller and take what they say at face value, especially when you’re looking to make a quick purchase. However, it could be worth your while to take a note of the vehicle’s details and do some research before you commit to buying or before you hand over any cash.

Here are a few reasons why you should consider performing a vehicle check before purchasing a used car, particularly if you’re not buying from an established car dealership:

Avoid Motoring Scams

When you delve into your vehicle’s history, you can check whether your car has been subject to illegal practices such as:

Clocking – when the odometer has been tampered with to show a lower mileage
Cloning – when the number plates have been replaced with those from an identical vehicle. This is usually to mask the identity of a stolen vehicle or to avoid parking tickets/fines
Cut and shut – when two or more cars have been welded together, usually to hide damage if a car has been written off in an accident

These are not easy for the untrained eye to spot so performing a check on your vehicle could be beneficial for protecting your investment. Owning a car that has fallen victim to these scams can affect the value and even the safety of the vehicle – something that, of course, you will want to avoid.

MOT Check

A vehicle MOT check can be incredibly useful for car buyers as it can reveal details about the vehicle’s mileage, expiry date and advisory notices. This can help you spot any vehicle scams like clocking easily, as well as highlighting whether a vehicle has been properly serviced and maintained by previous owners. If it has not been looked after well then it’ll have a long list of advisory notes, meaning there’s a higher risk of mechanical faults, which may be costly in the long run.

VIN Check

Every car comes with a unique Vehicle Identification Number (VIN) and any issues or problems are logged against this number. A VIN check can reveal whether the car has been stolen, cloned or have encountered any serious problems that have been masked. It is strongly advised to perform this check before purchasing a car as you could be putting yourself and your passengers at risk if you’re driving an unsafe car.

Logbook Check

You can also check the vehicle chassis number against the one recorded on your V5C document and logbook to check that everything is legitimate. Any vehicle that doesn’t have a V5C document is likely to have been cloned or stolen, which can lead to all sorts of problems, even if you didn’t know it was stolen when you purchased it. You risk having your vehicle seized by the police and you’ll lose the money that you paid for the car.

As you can see, checking the history of a vehicle before you buy it can reassure you that you’re spending your money on a legitimate vehicle. An extensive check into your vehicle’s history, which is available with HPI Check, can highlight any issues or mechanical faults that may cause you problems in the future. That way, you can protect yourself, both in terms of your safety and your hard-earned cash.