NCT situation

jezzer

I see now where the gardai have introduced another revenue generating scheme whereby they dish out 3 penalty points for having no NCT on the car, but with the backlog it may not be possible to have the nct and we cant do without our cars until we get an appointment, i bought a car at the beginning of this month, the car has no NCT, I booked it in for January which is the earliest i can get an appointment and printed off the booking if i am stopped can i be given 3 penalty points? surely this is not correct?

corktina

Just phone them, you'll get an appointment much quicker. (and don't drive it with no NCT if you are concerned you might get points)

BobMc

This is going to be interesting, imagine with the 1 yr NCT certs, you'll nearly have to book it in the same day for the next one, personally, I'll be going to court if I get points for no valid cert if I've made a reasonable effort to get a test and have a confirmation etc

martinsvi

try a different station, I never go to my nearest one as it's booked full, there is one a bit further away that always have openings just a few days away.

johnayo

Whether you get penalty points will depend on the Garda. I'm sure most will accept the booking sheet but if one don't, then I'm afraid it's penalty points.
As already advised, ring them back for an earlier appointment and if they can't give you one within the month, it will be for free.

jezzer

its a very messy situation and there should be allowances for people who genuinely have booked in for the NCT for as soon as posisble

ShaunieVW

Usually as long as you have a letter confirming you have bokked it in the Gardai will just wave you on.

bucketybuck

jezzer wrote: »

its a very messy situation and there should be allowances for people who genuinely have booked in for the NCT for as soon as posisble

Unfortunately you live in a nation of chancers, so no, this shouldn't be allowed. You will have the usual suspects making an appointment, then just ringing and asking to move that appointment back again and again. Sure who needs an actual NCT when you can just get by on a booking form.

It is not a bad thing for all cars to be properly tested, and the guards should not have the task of judging who is genuine and who is not. Instead we can have a very black and white system, does the car have a valid NCT or not? End of story. For most people blaming the NCT centres is just an excuse, get organised and you won't have any problems.

jezzer

bucketybuck before you go all righteous on us i suggest you read my post, i only recently bought the car, no nct so i went to make an appointment and find out the earliest i can get an appointment is january, in the meantime i need the car to get to work, i had a qualified mechanic check out the car and its in perfect order, the NCT thing is just a money racket, if you NCT a car, 6 months later it doesnt mean the car is roadworthy just because it was checked 6 months earlier, and road tax is a joke too, i would actually prefer to pay water charges than excessive road tax, at least we have a reasonable service for our water system, the roads in this country are a joke, they destroy cars, in the UK they pay a flat road tax fee which is more than enough

bucketybuck

jezzer wrote: »

bucketybuck before you go all righteous on us i suggest you read my post, i only recently bought the car, no nct so i went to make an appointment and find out the earliest i can get an appointment is january, in the meantime i need the car to get to work, i had a qualified mechanic check out the car and its in perfect order,

So you say, but how does the guard who stops you know that the car is roadworthy? How does he know a mechanic actually checked it? Some dodgy skanger would just say the exact same thing.

No, it should be black and white. Road legal or not road legal, tested or not tested. No more information needed.

jezzer

thats nonsence buckety, the guard can check when i bought the car and can see the receipt for the NCT booking and he can do a quick inspection of the vehicle and give me the benefit of the doubt as a decent law abiding citizen and let me go about my business, maybe putting as much resources into tackling knife crime would be better for the country instead of hassling decent people trying to make ends meet in this broken down state, its do gooders like you that have this nation ruined.

cletus

What would the garda be checking on your vehicle to ensure its road safe. Gardai are not mechanics, there is no reason to believe any random individual garda could make a call on the road worthiness of a car by giving it a quick look over

bucketybuck

jezzer wrote: »

thats nonsence buckety, the guard can check when i bought the car and can see the receipt for the NCT booking and he can do a quick inspection of the vehicle and give me the benefit of the doubt as a decent law abiding citizen and let me go about my business, maybe putting as much resources into tackling knife crime would be better for the country instead of hassling decent people trying to make ends meet in this broken down state, its do gooders like you that have this nation ruined.

No no no, we can't waste time tackling knife crime when there is so much gun crime happening right now! Its knife haters like you that have this nation ruined.

biko

Ok, I see things are getting heated, can everyone take a breath please.

OP, you may or may not get away with it if a Garda stops you, that's all there is to it.
Ring NCT every morning and see f you can get a quicker appointment.

Gumbo

jezzer wrote: »

and he can do a quick inspection of the vehicle and give me the benefit of the doubt as a decent law abiding citizen.

A Garda is not a mechanic, how can he check the car out and say it's ok?

bladespin

Try a different NCT centre.

martinsvi

I've just checked, there are some 6-8 slots available this week (some even on weekends) across the country, I really don't understand where's the problem

CiniO

jezzer wrote: »

its a very messy situation and there should be allowances for people who genuinely have booked in for the NCT for as soon as posisble

No there shouldn't be any allowance.
What there should be is a system where people could test their cars whenever they want without any prebooking few months in advance.

cletus

The problem with things like this is that people look at it as if the new law or rule has been put in place for their particular circumstance, when in fact it has been put in place for generalities, i.e. All cars shall have a valid nct cert, not you particularly, having bought a second hand car with no test, shall be punished because you cant get a test date to suit you.

Always in cases like this there are people who, for whatever reason, and through no real fault of their own, fall foul of it, but you cannot set exceptions for specific cases with a general rule or law. This is where loopholes originate

slimjimmc

OP, where are you and what test centres have you tried?
The NCT website seems to be updated nightly at around 11:30 pm so if you check in at that time you may be able to change your booking to an earlier slot. If you're able to go at short notice you could also ring NCTS first thing in the morning and see if there are any cancellations available.

BTW, your blame is misdirected. Only Government can introduce laws, the Gardaí can only enforce them. In fact the recent changes could be considered a relaxation because it was previously a mandatory court appearance and 5 points on conviction whereas now you have the opportunity to accept 3 points and a small fine. The majority of Gardaí are actually very tolerant of the situation if your NCT is not expired by long. However if your NCT is already a few months expired I'd be chasing NCTS daily for an immediate test date.

Gazzmonkey

The Garda must be pretty slack with their enforcement of this, I bought a car little over a year ago and only recently put it through the NCT. Now I have two years NCT when I should only have one year left

Drove from Wicklow to Dublin & back every day (minus weekends) for over a year now and I literally haven't seen one checkpoint or been stopped once.

Not even once !!!

jezzer

Dealing with nothing but idiots here, gardai frequently make calls on whether a car is roadworthy or not by checking tyre tread depth, all lights and indicators are working etc as smart as ye think ye are, ye are probably the same idiots that are out protesting against water charges and ringing the NCT centre is no use as they say they are booked up until i have my appointment and buckety if you are walking along some night minding your own business and get stabbed you might not find it so funny you complete idiot

cletus

jezzer wrote: »

Dealing with nothing but idiots here, gardai frequently make calls on whether a car is roadworthy or not by checking tyre tread depth, all lights and indicators are working etc as smart as ye think ye are, ye are probably the same idiots that are out protesting against water charges and ringing the NCT centre is no use as they say they are booked up until i have my appointment and buckety if you are walking along some night minding your own business and get stabbed you might not find it so funny you complete idiot

Gardai might stop you because of a broken light, etc. but they cannot look at a car that has no nct and decide on the spot whether the car is road worthy. If they could do that, the actual nct test would just be a fella walking along a line of cars with a tyre dept guage saying "Yep, that one's grand"

As I said already, the law has not been put in place to specifically attack or inconvenience you, it is a generality.

bucketybuck

jezzer wrote: »

Dealing with nothing but idiots here, gardai frequently make calls on whether a car is roadworthy or not by checking tyre tread depth, all lights and indicators are working etc as smart as ye think ye are,

Forget lights, a track rod end could be completely worn and about to fall out, a very real danger to the drivers safety and also something that a guard would never spot when trying to assess whether your car is roadworthy or not. A truck could have multiple loose body or chassis bolts, a real danger to safety and not something a guard could spot with the naked eye.

Its not the Guards job to assess whether a car is roadworthy and nor should it be. You are simply wrong.

celica00

Besides the fact if Gards can judge if the car is road worthy or not...

I ran into the same issue as OP explained...I found out the hard way, that beeing booked in doesn't even help.
I was stopped on a Friday and booked in for Wed (in fact just driving to the garage to get the car ready).

But didnt help anyway.
So if you are worried about points and NCT I would almost not risk it...or risk it and go to court if you are booked in already but takes so long.
There is always the prio list tho, so that could be an argument from "them" against you....

jezzer

there was a time when the guards used a bit of common sense in regard to minor issues like this, there was a time when you could go to your local guard if you had a problem, now they have to keep up their conviction numbers and a fool like me trying to do a decent days work is an easy target, who is more dangerous a lad genuinely waiting for an NCT or a lad carrying a knife or a gun for that matter

I tried 3 centres within proximity of where i live and work and the nearest booking i could get was january, i dont know where people see availability for this week, plus, am i supposed to get it towed to the nct centre if i am not supposed to have it on the road? some common sense should prevail here

celica00

jezzer wrote: »

I tried 3 centres within proximity of where i live and work and the nearest booking i could get was january, i dont know where people see availability for this week, plus, am i supposed to get it towed to the nct centre if i am not supposed to have it on the road? some common sense should prevail here

that's exactly it.
I actually will trail my car over there because I wont have any other option, it's a car I'm not depended on though but still....

biko

jezzer wrote: »

Dealing with nothing but idiots here... if you are walking along some night minding your own business and get stabbed you might not find it so funny you complete idiot

Ok, that's not on. Ban and thread closed.
Good luck with test.