The Best Car Finance Blog In The World

With Christmas approaching attitudes are now changing towards drinking and driving according to the AA (that’s Automobile Association not Alcoholics Anonymous) who carried out a survey amongst motorists and found that two thirds would notify the police if someone they knew drove under the influence of alcohol. There is also likely to be a change in European law soon following Read more »

Did the measures regarding VAT, announced by the Chancellor of the 24^th November, have any affect on drivers or the industry? Not much is the answer. The VAT drop on fuel has been balanced out by increased duty but will the duty come off again when VAT returns to it’s current level? It will also have the affect of putting up prices Read more »

Most of us are aware that talking on a hand held mobile phone whilst driving is illegal as is sending text messages but a district judge ruling in a recent case took the issue of using a mobile phone whilst driving one step further when a driver was caught switching off the alarm on his phone. The judge ruled that the act of switching off the alarm on the phone constituted Read more »

As often happens I have found myself at odds with some leasing companies who are promoting either sale and rentback or sale and leaseback. The majority of company vehicles are still owned outright and with times getting tougher out there some lenders have been promoting a scheme known as sale and rentback, whereby you sell your company cars to Read more »

Would you like to be a road worker? I know we all complain about the 3 miles of cones before we get to the 10’ stretch of central reservation being repaired by 4 road workers but frankly it’s not a job that I would like to do given the lunatic way that some motorists thrash down the reduced lanes of the motorway or A road. Unsurprisingly 10 road workers were killed and 81 were seriously injured Read more »

Hands up all those who are aware that Land Rover and Jaguar are now owned by Indian motor manufacturer Tata? I thought as much, even though in a recent report the Times Online referred to the takeover as one of the highest profile Indian takeovers in the UK most people still believe that Land Rover and Jaguar are owned by Ford. As a result of the takeover just 9 months ago one could be expected to Read more »

The leasing sector is starting to contract as was predicted in my newsletter a few weeks ago. GE Capital Solutions, number 8 in the top 50 leasing companies in the UK says it will no longer deal with fleets of less than 50 vehicles. The company says that it wants to concentrate its efforts in Read more »

 Lease cars are better maintained than privately owned cars – fact! Hitachi Capital Vehicle Solutions carried out a check on privately owned cars to see how well maintained they were and shockingly found that 88% were in need of attention. Whilst Hitachi admitted that some faults were somewhat minor there were a significant number that were more serious such as Read more »

Times are getting tougher, I don’t need to tell you that but if you are considering changing your car you need to consider who is going to supply your finance if you are going to use someone off the internet. One of the latest problems faced by applicants is the tightening of underwriting by lenders. Missing a couple of credit card payments, something that would have been ignored by lenders a year ago, is enough for some lenders running short of money to turn their back on you. And if you think about it Read more »

Following from my recent warnings about the use of some brokers that advertise on the Internet the British Vehicle Rental and Leasing Association (BVRLA) have warned also that it is a big risk using a broker who is not accredited by one of the professional bodies. We are members of the NACFB and in addition to complying to a code of practice it is also a condition of membership Read more »