Taxi Driver Online

Driver A rented a plate from Plate Owner B, Driver A used his own vehicle to attach the plate to, on a verbal contract

Driver A handed over his vehicle log book V5 as per Council regs to Plate owner B, Plate owner B inserted his name and address etc etc

Driver A got sick and tired of renting as Plate Owner B kept putting up the cost, so Driver A handed plate back and paid up todate the rental costs

3 months down the line Driver A has still not got his V5 back.
Plate owner B wants 160 quid as administration costs before he hands back V5 to Driver A in his own name.

What should Driver A do now to get back his documents in his own name.

If B attached his details to the car when he wasn't the owner then surely a fraud has taken place.

The problem is A might be complicit in the fraud as he knew what was going on.

Maybe A should ask the council to suspend B's plate until this is all settled.

Methinks that would make B think a bit.

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IDFIMH

Didn't the council transfer the plate to Driver A in the case that went to the ombudsman?

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Taxi Driver Online
www.taxi-driver.co.uk

NO
Lets start again
Plate owner B who didn't want to work lets[rents] his plate out to someone [in this case, driver A] who wants to rent a hack plate and put the plate on his own vehicle. [Driver A's vehicle]

To stop the renter [hirer] of the plate running off with the rented plate [just like the Hull case,[10 odd years ago] where some dozen or so drivers of rented plates took it to court and won ownership of the plates, as the plates were on their vehicles, the vehicles had been tested taxi wise, with their name an address in the log book] the Judge at Hull court agreed with the drivers.

most council stipulate that the vehicle that is plated with a rented plate has to have the V5 registered with the plate owners name and address before the vehicle is taxi tested, [in other words delete Driver A from log book, insert Owner B as new owner/keeper of vehicle, then send off to DVLA, change of ownership.

in this case plate owner B's name and address replaces the driver A's address on the V5, so therefore Owner B still owns the plate and is registered keeper of the vehicle, but Driver A has full use of the vehicle and still own's the vehicle but is not the registered keeper anymore.

PHEW

Yes, but the only difference with the Bournemouth and Hull cases is that an attempt was made to disguise the illegality - while the name on the V5 is the registered keeper, and some LAs may be satisifed with that, in reality nothing of substance has changed, and the driver remained the owner/proprietor of the vehicle. Thus in effect a fraudulent misrepresentation was made to disguise the illegality.

Wasn't this what happened on a larger scale in Dundee and Aberdeen, with the only relevance of the name on the V5 being that it made it more difficult to prove that the license was being misused?

But I don't know how the driver can go about getting the V5 back, since he's clearly implicated in the illegality. Of course, he could complain to officialdom, but then his part in the proceedings may come to light, and thus could backfire, and it's difficult to know how councils might react in a situation like this - in Bournemouth and Hull they got the plates, while in Dundee I think some of the drivers were stripped of their licenses? (Or at least vehicle license, although if he wanted to go PH or hope for a taxi license later then there could be implications in this regard.)

Personally I could never see the logic of giving the driver the plate because in effect it's rewarding him for a situation in which he was complicit, and the only difference with the Dundee scenario seemed to be the a bit of paper shuffling, which to my mind does not make it fundamentally more dishonest.

If I was the driver I would sabre-rattle a bit about getting the authorities involved and offer the plate holder £20 (say) as an olive branch. After all, since there's a possibility that the license holder could lose the plate if the driver complained to the council, then he could well realise that he has more to lose than the driver.

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Taxi Driver Online
www.taxi-driver.co.uk

would owner B have the same surname as del boy by any chance