Irish VRT.ie

The Irish Independent has an interesting piece on the amount of cars being imported into Ireland from the UK.

THE number of used-car imports nearly doubled in one month this summer, according to new figures. The dramatic surge stems mainly from cost-conscious buyers looking elsewhere for lower prices as the credit crunch bites coupled with a 20pc fall in the value of sterling.

It appears there is much confusion at the moment whether an imported car is based on the old system, engine size, or the new system, CO2.

Well it is actually based on both by the looks of it. Cars registered in another country before 1 July 2008 will have their VRT applied to the engine size. Cars registered in another country after 1 July 2008 will have their VRT applied based on its CO2 figure.

I have no definite online source that says it is this way. Only a recent imported car story from a reader of this site stating

...registered a 1.8tdci car 2007 with 137 co2 ... had to tax it under the old regime even if the vrt was only 16%...

Anybody have any similar experiences? Please comment...

Mr. John Gormley, T.D., Minister for the Environment, Heritage and Local Government today (19th June 2008) launched the new vehicle labelling system which will apply to all new cars at the point of sale from 1st July 2008.

The Government recently introduced changes to Vehicle Registration Tax (VRT) and annual motor tax for new cars registered on or after 1st July 2008 .  Both taxes will be calculated on the basis of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from vehicles rather than engine size.  Seven emission/tax bands have been created and VRT and motor tax payable will be determined by the relevant band for each vehicle. A key element of the whole initiative to rebalance the VRT and motor tax regimes on the basis of CO2 emissions is the introduction of a new labelling system designed to reflect the seven emission/tax bands.