Importing A Car from Inside or Outside the EU

Nowadays, importing a car from overseas is common-place. With the world a smaller place and people’s increasing propensity to move from place to place, we see many cars crossing our borders every day. In addition to people moving their homes there are also the bargain hunters who look to import their cars from overseas to take advantage of the higher specifications that can be had from places like Japan.

So many people find themselves wanting to import but when it comes down to it, many are not sure of the process so this page is here to give you all the information you need for both importing a car from inside and outside of the EU respectively. We will also look at the protocol for temporarily importing a car into the UK.

We found this very useful DVLA page detailing the steps on How to Import a vehicle into Great Britain.

This summary of these pages are:

1. Tell the HMRC within 14 days of importing the car
2. Pay VAT and duty as per HMRC request
3. Get vehicle approval to show vehicle meets standards required for UK roads
4. Register and Tax your vehicle
5. Get insurance for the imported vehicle

Temporarily importing a car

For people visiting the UK with their own car from overseas on a temporary basis, there are certain rules to adhere to. Whether a temporary student, worker or general visitor to the UK, this page gives you everything you need to know.

What is the Individual Vehicle Approval (IVA) Scheme?

This is an inspection process that all special goods vehicles that haven’t been ‘type approved’ for UK roads need to go through. Details of the process and fees are included on the government IVA page