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I recently answered a frequent question in one of my standard mailouts which received a massive response so I am reprinting it on my blog for you to come back to if needed. Part 2 will be a further blog when sent out to my database, here is part 1:

I live just outside Brighton, a newly formed city that I rarely visit during the summer because of the traffic and the inability to park, but I had cause to pop down there last week and ended up parking in Hove Actually and walking back into Brighton. It was a pleasant walk but as I was passing cars parked at the side of the road I started to notice that people had left nickable items on clear display inside the car.

Thinking of a change but unsure as to the best way to finance your car? Then you need a copy of my car finance book, Car Finance – A Simple Guide by Graham Hill. Click on the link below to buy the best car finance book on the market, available as a Kindle Book and Paper Back.

I saw all sorts from laptops to tablets, mobile phones, sat navs, piles of shopping spread across the back seat and several bags of all sizes, from handbags to sports bags, left on display on the front passenger’s seat or on the back seat. It made me think because I had only just read a report by Mike Waters of Arval who, in my opinion, stated the bloody obvious when he explained what people should do to prevent car thefts.

He was commenting on the number of prestige cars that were being stolen on a regular basis and what measures you should take in order to avoid your car being stolen. Having witnessed what I saw I thought that maybe I should share this nugget as some readers (not you of course) could be dopey enough not to understand the basic rules of protecting your car.

The first rule is of course to leave nothing on display. Anything of value should be left at home and if that isn’t practical lock it in the boot. You may not be too concerned about the loose change left in the centre console for use in car parks but that £2 contributes towards a can of Special Brew to some.

They are 2 quid better off and you are £75 worth of glass insurance excess the worse off.  Mr Waters says, ‘Always lock your vehicle and close the windows and sunroof. I have to say this seems obvious but how often do you or people you see leave their car on a garage forecourt whilst they pay for their fuel with windows open and the car unlocked?

There are thieves who target garage forecourts to either steal cars or their contents. Keep car keys out of sight, never put them down and even at home make sure they cannot be seen from the outside through a window or letter box. It is easier to break into a house and steal the keys than break into the car and have to hotwire it to get it started. Secure your number plates with tamperproof or clutch head screws.

Not sure about that one. False plates with a bit of double sided on the back can be stuck to the old number plate in seconds. Another suggestion that I don’t necessarily agree with, lock your car in a garage and lock both the car and the garage. I have found, and reported in the past, that if you show that your car is parked in a garage overnight when applying for insurance it can be more expensive than parked in the street. It can be easier to steal a car if the thief can carry out the theft whilst the car is in a garage rather than out in the street.

When away from home, try to park in a well lit, open location, or a police approved ‘ParkMark’ car park. I would add – in sight of a CCTV camera. Finally fit a tracking device to your vehicle and have the car registration number etched on all windows. By Graham Hill

Emission Analytics have found that the economy ratings on tyres can be misleading and inaccurate. The way that the economy ratings are shown at the moment may not give the full story if their findings are to be believed.

Thinking of a change but unsure as to the best way to finance your car? Then you need a copy of my car finance book, Car Finance – A Simple Guide by Graham Hill. Click on the link below to buy the best car finance book on the market, available as a Kindle Book and Paper Back.

The company specialises in emission data and carried out a series of tests on tyres with various efficiency ratings only to find that those with a lower efficiency rating can perform just as well as those with a high efficiency rating. The test compared F- and B- rated tyres and found that between 40 – 55 mph the more expensive B- rated tyre only saved about 4% in fuel.

The gap between the two only widened when the speed increased to 70mph when the economy tyre returned a 13% saving. The company found that at mid-range speeds, F rated tyres can perform as well as B rated tyres.

Nick Molden, founder of the company, expressed concern that buyers and fleets were paying extra for tyres that weren’t providing the return they were expecting if the journeys are confined to urban routes. He went on to say, ‘Tyre-efficiency labels don’t provide enough information for buyers to make an informed choice.’ He is calling for action to better inform tyre buyers who could be making decisions based on fiction. By Graham Hill

For those that think that the days of scams in the motor industry are a thing of the past – think on! In the piece sent out last Friday I explained that I would happily buy an ex lease or ex daily rental car but avoid an ex demonstrator like the plague!

Thinking of a change but unsure as to the best way to finance your car? Then you need a copy of my car finance book, Car Finance – A Simple Guide by Graham Hill. Click on the link below to buy the best car finance book on the market, available as a Kindle Book and Paper Back.

Someone who probably agrees with me is John Quinn who bought an ex demonstrator Range Rover Vogue. As most of the Range Rovers dropping off the end of the production line at Land Rover are destined for the Middle East, China or Russia there was a long waiting list so as John couldn’t wait he paid the full retail price of a new car for a demonstrator.

The car was 6 months old with 3,000 miles on the clock when he bought it. The Range Rover was then sold on to a private buyer who complained to John that the heated and electric seats weren’t working. The car was returned by John to the supplying main dealer for them to fix the problem under the warranty.

However, they found that the seats had been swapped by the dealer with those fitted in a Vogue SE to satisfy a customer. They then found that the wiring of the seats in the SE was not compatible with a Vogue so the electrics would never work and as the seats were changed it invalidated the warranty on the seats.

The dealer refused to pay for the repair and Land Rover passed it straight back to the dealer – and rightly so. A big thing was made over the price that John had paid and he wouldn’t have paid full price if he had known that the seats would no longer function. First of all the price is totally irrelevant other than to maybe add a little weight to John’s argument but it isn’t material.

What is material is what he bought. Did he buy the car he was told he was buying? The change of seats was explained to John but it wasn’t mentioned that they weren’t working and never would. When buying a used car you buy it as seen so whilst a car may have an LX badge on the boot and say that it is an LX in the registration document it doesn’t have to conform to LX spec. as I’ve mentioned in the past.

This would change of course if the dealer selling you the car confirmed that the car matched the original manufacturers spec of the car. If the dealer knew the seats weren’t working they had an obligation to tell the buyer so he has a chance here as they ‘withheld material information about the car that could influence the buying decision’.

However, they have argued that they weren’t aware that the electrics weren’t working and common sense tells you if you know that the seats have been changed you would check that the electrics work OK – if it was likely to affect your buying decision. The argument continues between himself, the dealer and the manufacturer but yet again it raises some interesting questions, which, in this case, looks as though will only be resolved in court.

But the bottom line is that when you buy an ex demonstrator it could have been driven harder than a hire car and you are buying a used car that could hide all sorts of scary things that you should be, but often aren’t, made aware of. Buy or lease a new car from a reputable dealer or broker and you remove much of the risk.

Don’t go for the cheapest because you may be subject to a scam, the ex demonstrator that has been clocked by the dealer supplying a lease car via a dodgy broker (bucket shop). The new car that was intended for the daily rental market in ‘sub spec’ condition sold to a leasing company as a full spec brand new car. You know the rest as I bang on about it enough. By Graham Hill

It would seem that more and more Brits are hiring cars whilst on holiday. So as we come up to the serious holiday season it is quite timely for me to give you a bit of advice that could save you a lot of money if you are one of them. In a survey carried out by the Post Office it revealed that more than half of British holidaymakers hiring cars in Europe could face a huge hidden rental bill.

Thinking of a change but unsure as to the best way to finance your car? Then you need a copy of my car finance book, Car Finance – A Simple Guide by Graham Hill. Click on the link below to buy the best car finance book on the market, available as a Kindle Book and Paper Back.

The survey revealed that 56% of UK holidaymakers aren’t protecting themselves from accidents or theft with excess waiver insurance (EWI). Three quarters don’t bother with cover for glass, tyre or undercarriage damage. On average this extra insurance, payable on arrival, is about 12% of the cost of the excess but drivers are either not aware or ignore this insurance and run the risk of being hundreds of pounds out of pocket.

And don’t think the excess is the same as your domestic car insurance policy if you have an accident whilst in say Spain or Portugal of say £250, oooh no! The average accidental excess in Spain is £839 and in Portugal is £903 but the EWI and tyre and glass cover is just £99.10 and £87.55 respectively for 7 days cover.

Oh, and if you venture off the main roads in Greece, Spain or many other holiday countries you could hit a pothole that makes our potholes look like dimples causing all manner of expensive damage to wheels, suspension, brakes, undercarriage etc. Andrew Brown of Post Office Travel Money said, ‘It’s a false economy to cut costs by sticking to the basic cost when booking car rental online.

English: An old AVIS Car Rental advert on a side of a building. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

What’s more don’t leave it till you get to your holiday destination to find out what the hire car will really cost. Calculate all the costs by doing your homework in advance to find out the realistic price of car rental and holiday motoring.’ Good advice there from Mr Brown. Happy holiday! By Graham Hill

Related articles

• The great car hire rip off in Europe: £1,000 excess charges and insurance that DOUBLES the price of car rental (dailymail.co.uk)
• Holidaymakers warned about car hire costs: It’s cheapest in Cyprus at £295 week (while in Majorca it’s a whopping £514) (dailymail.co.uk)

Oh dear, I once again find myself disagreeing with the self promoted ‘Motoring’s most outspoken and opinionated colomnist’ Mike Rutherford. This time over electric cars. He has described 100% electric cars as ‘stillborn’.

Thinking of a change but unsure as to the best way to finance your car? Then you need a copy of my car finance book, Car Finance – A Simple Guide by Graham Hill. Click on the link below to buy the best car finance book on the market, available as a Kindle Book and Paper Back.

He has written a rather amusing article in which he goes head to head with Richard Bruce who is the head of the Office for Low Emission Vehicles (OLEV) over the reasons why we should persevere with electric vehicles(EV’s). Quite naturally Mr Bruce is heavily in favour of EV’s as without them his job pretty much becomes meaningless so of course he is in favour.

Mr Rutherford’s point is that they are expensive and you can’t cover more than 100 miles in one charge, both of which are reasonably true – at the moment. But not everyone needs a car to cover more than 100 miles in a single trip and for those that do there will come a time when cars will be able to cover over 1,000 miles with a single charge.

Look, I’m not a huge fan of electric cars but I’m not going to suggest for one minute that after spending £millions if not £billions in research that we should simply throw out the idea and revert to fossil fuel vehicles or mixtures of fossil fuel engines and battery power packs. That Mr Rutherford is simply dopey!

And don’t forget this is electricity we are talking about – just think back to the days of Thomas Edison, it only takes one experiment to solve the problem even though it may have taken hundreds of experiments previously. With what I have read and reported upon we are rapidly moving closer to the point where cars can cover several hundred miles on one charge, chargers can charge very rapidly and as volumes grow prices will tumble as a result.

Even now we can provide a Nissan Leaf, after allowing for the Government grant for less than £200 + VAT per month on a car that costs over £21,000. My money is on Mr Bruce and whilst he is very protective about EV’s I believe he has a good point and for many drivers EV’s represent the future so go off and have a whinge about something else Mr Rutherford. Don’t you just hate these people that can only moan and groan about things! By Graham Hill

You may remember the days when a mobile phone battery only lasted for 4 hours before it ran flat so the solution was to carry a spare battery that sat in the charger with the phone giving you 8 hours of standby time and 60 minutes of call time.

Thinking of a change but unsure as to the best way to finance your car? Then you need a copy of my car finance book, Car Finance – A Simple Guide by Graham Hill. Click on the link below to buy the best car finance book on the market, available as a Kindle Book and Paper Back.

Then the new batteries came along and increased substantially the standby time and talk time meaning that you could be out for a complete day and not think about the phone dying on you but what if you are nowhere near a USB connector or unable to plug in a charger? The answer could be a mobile charger.

You charge up the mobile charger which then stores enough electricity to charge your mobile around five times before the charger itself needs charging. Unfortunately the power pack takes around 5 hours to charge but given the extra range that it gives your mobile phone I don’t think that is too bad.

One such device is the Just Mobile Gum++ Charger which fits into the palm of your hand. It costs 69.95 Euros (£57) and can be bought online. Go and have a look by visiting www.just-mobile.eu well worth a look. Oh one last thing it can only be charged via a USB connector, it doesn’t come with a mains plug. By Graham Hill

If you are a Formula 1 team boss you will be spending small fortunes to squeeze a little extra out of your cars in order to win races. The component parts they spend most time developing their cars around are the tyres whilst, at the same time, the tyre manufacturer providing all the tyres to the teams, is looking at ways to improve grip and thereby handling whilst reducing drag.

Thinking of a change but unsure as to the best way to finance your car? Then you need a copy of my car finance book, Car Finance – A Simple Guide by Graham Hill. Click on the link below to buy the best car finance book on the market, available as a Kindle Book and Paper Back.

Tyres are a very critical part of an F1 car and with the new limits on the amount of fuel you can start a race with the tyre manufacturer has also to consider fuel consumption. But what does all this mean to the likes of you and me?

If you are anything like me, when you need a couple of tyres, you search the Internet for the cheapest premium brand with little regard to the characteristics of the tyre and whether the tyres will provide optimum performance, grip and fuel consumption without the noise of tyres on road drowning out the soft sounds of Luther on the stereo system.

So do we know and understand enough about the tyres we have fitted on our car? I would suggest not because at some point our lives may actually rely upon our choice of tyre. So let me enlighten you with a few of the basics and some of the latest developments, some of which we should thank F1 designers for.

Our first consideration is price which can vary considerably, not only between tyres but at different times of the year. This is because the price of the three most important component parts fluctuate massively in the open market, independent of each other, these being rubber, steel and oil.

In order to make tyres more efficient, long lasting and safer more and more money has to be invested each year which adds to the cost of the tyres. Legal demands such as the fitting of Tyre Pressure Monitoring Systems (TPMS) to all cars manufactured after November 2012 adds to the cost.

The current systems rely upon a transmitter fitted to the valve and powered by a small battery but the latest developments will result in a microchip being embedded within the tyre without the need for a battery. But this type of development costs a fortune which has to be recovered out of the price that tyres are sold at.

Not only will the microchip satisfy the legal requirements it will also monitor tyre temperature and performance that will allow the car settings to be optimised. In future the chip will also interact with weather conditions to influence the car’s behaviour. As the chip tells the car about the tyre’s temperature and pressure this information could then be used to adjust braking, steering and ESP responses.

Dunlop are looking at how the chip technology could be used to manage the tyre throughout its life, telling the driver about tread wear and condition. Even better news is that the tyre manufacturers believe that the new chip technology will be cheaper to fit that the current tyre pressure monitor systems required by law.

The main problem is that of retro fit, whilst the manufacturers agree that the new technology can be easily integrated into new cars it is proving to be a challenge to fit into existing cars – but it is being worked on. As mentioned earlier the component parts of the tyre come at a highly fluctuating cost so the manufacturers are looking at ways alternatives can be used.

Currently they are working on alternatives to oil, something that has been ongoing for many years but the latest advances in replacement commodoties have been made in the development of alternative and more sustainable rubber. The new rubbers are being extracted from maize, soya and even dandelion plants.

The rubber is extracted from the dandelion roots and believe it or not, according to Continental brand manager, Peter Robb, ‘It offers the most potential for the biggest impact on tyre manufacture for years.’ One of the biggest advantages is that the plants can be grown close to the manufacturing plant reducing delivery time and costs.

They reckon that they will have tyres using this new rubber by 2020. The new type of natural rubber will also have the benefit of being harder and longer wearing and some claim that CO2 emissions could be cut by 10g/km. Also the harder compound will reduce road noise. Another area of development at the moment is airless tyres being held up by a series of vanes.

This development is being pioneered by Bridgestone but it is suggested that this is years away from fruition as the development so far has produced tyres with a maximum load capacity of 410kg and a top speed of 37mph. Way to go methinks! Another challenge faced by manufacturer is the desire of drivers to have large, more aesthetically pleasing wheels fitted to their cars.

Apparently this is particular to the UK. The rest of Europe is not so concerned so the manufacturers are trying to come up with a solution that still makes the car look attractive but makes the tyres more environmentally friendly with lower rolling resistance, lower road noise, better fuel consumption and using less materials.

Electric vehicles may lead the way with the new BMW i3 having 155/70 R19 fitted. Quieter tyres are also on the way as the demand from drivers increase and legislation tightens. Continental developed the Contisilent tyre originally for the Audi RS6 fitted with very wide and low profile tyres.

Dunlop Tyres (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

They managed to substantially reduce the noise by fitting a foam strip to the inner surface of the tyre circumference. This acted like a damper reducing vibrations that transmit through the suspension and body into the cabin. The manufacturers will be paying more attention to this technology as legislation becomes stricter. So there you have it a roundup of the latest tyre technology. Airless tyres and dandelion rubber. By Graham Hill

Related articles

• Dunlop reveals tyres that can ‘talk’ to car (telegraph.co.uk)

If you are one of those that use the Dartford Tunnel/Bridge you will know that either side of the Thames can get a tad congested from time to time. This is annoying and can cause a wait of anything up to half an hour (my experience) but you know when the congestion is likely to occur so you try to avoid those times.

Thinking of a change but unsure as to the best way to finance your car? Then you need a copy of my car finance book, Car Finance – A Simple Guide by Graham Hill. Click on the link below to buy the best car finance book on the market, available as a Kindle Book and Paper Back.

Foreigners and truck drivers don’t seem to know these times so if you find yourself in one of these tailbacks or even whilst cruising at reasonable speed towards the toll booths you can find yourself flapping whilst trying to dig your change out of your pocket ready to throw into the bin located at the toll.

This isn’t helped when you have a juggernaut on one side of you and a foreign driver on the other side, all doing the same. But amazingly very few run into each other and the delays, as far as I’m concerned are minimal.

However, they could do one thing that would speed things along and that is to take those who have pay as you go Dart Tags fitted to their vehicles that enables them to simply drive through the toll without stopping to have a type of bus lane (Dart Tag Lane) reserved for them, about 2 miles before the crossing.

To segregate at the last minute, as happens at the moment) means that these people are sitting way back in the queue, adding to the congestion whilst the Dart Tag booths sit mainly unused until the Dart drivers peel off. Now that to me would be an excellent solution. Not so according to the Highways Agency who will be removing the booths from October 2014.

The booths will be replaced by a remote system similar to the congestion charge. As with the congestion charge anyone not paying the fee will receive a penalty charge. But the good news is that you can pay online, by text, at shops and by phone. A pre-pay option will also be available which, according to the Highways Agency, will save users up to a third of the fee.

Hmmm, this all sounds good if you are a regular user but it seems to me that instead of fumbling in your pocket for a few coins drivers will be busy calling and texting whilst driving or stopping short of the tunnel/bridge in order to prevent a penalty charge. I think we have some interesting times ahead on the M25! Or again, is it just me? By Graham Hill

I know I keep whinging on about the FCA and their new rules but I am genuinely worried about the affect it is having on the ability of lenders and intermediaries to do business and for genuine borrowers to be able to take out finance. As a result I’ve become pre-occupied with the subject of affordability and how lenders can analyse the application from a client to assess whether the customer should receive the finance or not.

Thinking of a change but unsure as to the best way to finance your car? Then you need a copy of my car finance book, Car Finance – A Simple Guide by Graham Hill. Click on the link below to buy the best car finance book on the market, available as a Kindle Book and Paper Back.

The problem that lenders have faced for years is – will the applicant make his repayments? The only way they have been able to assess this is by combining historical data with statistics to arrive at a pretty Heath Robinson credit score.

From the information obtained from the credit reference agencies combined with the lenders own score card requirements a further analysis takes place using statistics to arrive at an acceptance, decline or an acceptance subject to certain conditions or additional information.

For example if you are married with children in a house that you ‘own’ you are less of a risk and more likely to pay than a single person with no dependents living in rented accommodation. The fact that you own your house and have made your mortgage payments on time contributes towards your credit score but the fact that you are married with dependents is part of the lender’s score card. Now here is the confusion created by simply looking at your credit score.

Your credit reference agency score could be excellent because you have a credit card with a £2,000 limit on it that is paid on the button each month with a small balance on the card that every 3 months is fully paid off. All other payments are made on time including your mortgage which shows you own your property and you have no adverse whatsoever on the file.

But just because you have an excellent credit score doesn’t mean that you can afford to take out a finance agreement that will cost you £500 per month. You may show that historically you have met all your commitments and therefore represent a good credit risk but where is affordability in all this?

The lender’s own score card may show that having responsibilities, like a mortgage and children, living in a certain area in a certain job may statistically make you a good risk, there is nothing to prove it and I believe that it is this shortfall that has caused the Government via the FCA to force the lenders to test the ability to pay rather than the intention to pay.

But my question is this – if, through some twist of fate or luck the system worked – why try to fix it to the detriment of all concerned? We know that short term or pay day lending is a totally different type of product and given the distress that the collection and ability to rollover the debt, thereby substantially increasing the amount owed, causes consumers, it makes sense that lenders apply a more stringent set of affordability tests.

But that doesn’t apply to normal lending where the lenders have many years of experience under their belt and know who represents a good risk and who represents a bad risk. It’s a little like Ford identifying a problem with Focuses manufactured between 2010 and 2012 but recalling all Focuses ever made just to be on the safe side. It’s ridiculous.

In my simple opinion the ‘problem’ is being approached from the wrong end as I believe that generally most people have the intention to pay and have already personally checked the affordability of the finance out of their income. If someone dies in a car accident the Government doesn’t stop everyone from driving.

Lessons need to be learned, addressed and repaired to prevent it from happening again. The same applies to lending. But it already does. The lenders would soon go out of business if the number of defaults and arrears kept increasing so they are obviously refining their credit underwriting but even the lenders don’t have access to a crystal ball to see into the future.

The Government needs to spend money on helping those with debt problems, assist them in managing the debt and help them to recover with least pain to them and their family. When it takes two and a half years for the Financial Ombudsman to review a complaint it is clearly here that effort and money needs to be funnelled not into affordability checks that the lenders do quite adequately.

I ask the question again, what happens to those that wish to borrow money for a car in order to get to work or get their kids to school when the lender, after applying the new tests says no? The whole FCA concept has been ill conceived and badly thought through and for once it has nothing to do with the EU. By Graham Hill