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Poland again refuses RHD cars

Friday, January 29th, 2010

Over the last few days the news has been full of stories that Poland’s supreme administrative court (naczelny sąd administracyjny) ruled on the 27th of January 2010 that the minister of transport has lawful permission to refuse the registration of right-hand drive (RHD) vehicles.

If you have read the story and comments on my earlier blog post about English Cars in Poland you will know that until now it has been possible (although difficult) to register a RHD vehicle if the minister of transport gives permission.

This is against the European Union directives on free movement of goods which is why the EU reminded Poland in October 2009 that refusing to register RHD vehicles is against EU law and demanded a change in Poland’s regulations.

This new ruling by the supreme court is a result of Grzegorz Dorobek attempting to register his RHD Vauxhall Vectra and getting denied by his local authorities in June 2008. He took the matter to court from where it escalated. The voivodeship court in Kielce (Wojewódzki Sąd Administracyjny w Kielcach) ruled in April 2009 that “the positioning of the driver on the right-hand side has a negative effect on road safety” and that improving safety should be a fundamental target in a given country, therefore EU laws have no foundation to demand registration of this type of vehicle. This decision was upheld by the supreme court.

Dorobek’s lawyer argued that Poland’s current position is confusing given that some RHD vehicles are given permission and some aren’t. After the ruling Dorobek said he would consider taking the matter further to the EU.

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Tags: cars, poland, RHD, vehicles
Posted in vehicles and driving | 3 Comments »

Fly or Ferry?

Friday, October 3rd, 2008

This year my family and I will be spending Christmas back in the UK. Knowing how expensive flights can get at what must be the busiest time of year I now have the dilema of deciding when to travel and with who.

According to www.cheap-flight-poland.co.uk my choices (now that Centralwings have ceased flying) seem to be RyanAir, EasyJet or BA. RyanAir is the cheapest at 2000 PLN but they only fly to Stanstead which is the wrong side of London for me and thus a total pain. EasyJet want over 2500 PLN for 4 adults and a baby. Plus I am not totally confident with the way the small airlines have gone recently that either of them will still be in business by Christmas anyway. So that leaves me with BA but they want over 3000 PLN.

Then I had an idea – ferry! A quick search on this boooking engine:

reveals that I can get a ferry for £55 return! Using the route planner at viamichelin.co.uk my estimated return fuel cost is about £250. Thus I can get 4 adults there and back for around £300 instead of the £600+ the airlines want.

A good tip is to check the Dover-Dunkerque route because NorfolkLine ferries do that route and they seem to be regularly cheaper than P&O and the likes who do the Dover-Calais route.

Another ferry tip is that the time you travel affects the price, but the ferry companies know that when you are driving half-way across Europe you may be a little earlier or later. NorfolkLine give you at least a 4 hour window. So if you want to sail at 1800 (for example) have a look and see if the 2000 or 2200 sailing is cheaper and book that one. Turn up at 1800 as planned and you’ve saved yourself another few quid.

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Tags: ferry
Posted in vehicles and driving | 2 Comments »

Driving differences between UK and Poland

Saturday, August 16th, 2008

Whilst googling for Polish traffic news I just happened to find an article called Jak jeżdzić po Anglii? (How to drive around in England) on the popular Polish portal onet.pl. Out of curiosity I had a quick read and it showed up some differences that I hadn’t been aware of:

As you might expect, our road signs are a little different. But unless you have recently passed your test who honestly remembers what they all mean anyway? So I didn’t pay too much attention to that paragraph except the bit regarding this sign:
As I am sure you remember from the Highway Code (nod along blankly if you don’t) in the UK this means “National Speed Limits now appy”, which in a car with no trailer means 60mph or 70mph on a dual carriage-way. Therefore whenever I saw this sign in Poland I put my foot down. But according to that article in Poland it means “previous signs banning things no longer apply” and thus has nothing to do with speed limits. Whoops.
Seatbelts – they change the law all the time on this back in the UK so I haven’t got a clue what the rules are now anyway. It used to be that children under 14 didn’t need a belt in the back. Now babies need a car seat. Now your pet dog needs to be bolted to the floor. Well probably. The rules in fact according to this article say:
- In Britain – Everyone has to wear a seatbelt. There are no exceptions for pregnant women or those in the back. Children under 12 not taller than 135cm need a kiddy seat or booster seat.
- In Poland – similar except women who are “visibly pregnant” don’t need to wear a belt. The kiddy rule is the same except the height limit is 150cm.
Alcohol – Britain has a very liberal blood-alcohol limit of 0.8. Most of Europe is 0.5. Poland is 0.2 which leaves you very very little margin to drive if you have had anything to drink at all. Personally I don’t drive if I have had a drink at all and was aware of this, but worth mentioning.
Penalty points – In Britain if you get 12 points you lose your licence. Most speeding offences carry 3 points and they last for 3 years. Poland is not so strict. Points only last 1 year and you don’t feel them until you have racked up 24 points! Plus if you aren’t spanking it down the road it’s probably only 2 points anyway. But this is irrelevant for most of us – Poles will be driving in the UK on a Polish licence (thus no British points for them) and likewise for us Brits in Poland. The EU is a great thing!
Headlights – this should be simple. If it get’s dark, turn them on. If it’s not, turn them off. But it’s not:
- UK – headlights required when visibility falls below 100 metres. Only side-lights are required in built-up areas with street-lighting.
- Poland – headlights (not sidelights) required 24/7 365. Worth mentioning that this previously was a requirement only in winter months, but as of 2007 it is summer months too. But I saw on the news they are debating reverting it back to winter months again…. oh Politicians!

Happy motoring.

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Tags: driving, poland, road signs
Posted in life and living, vehicles and driving | 3 Comments »

Buying Polish Car Insurance

Wednesday, June 25th, 2008

I have never quite understood how Polish car insurance works, but now that the policy that came with my car is about to run out I have had to go and find out about it…

Here is what I know. If anyone has anything to add please leave a comment as always – I hope this article can be a work in progress.

The insurance is ‘with the car’, not ‘with the person’ as in the UK

What does this mean? Well in the UK the policy normally allows you and only you to drive your car unless you add specific named drivers. As a bonus you can normally drive other people’s cars on 3rd party cover too. In Poland it is the other way around – anyone can drive your car if you bought a policy for it.
This is a bit confusing because in both cases the policies specify both the driver and the car.
The net result for us Brits though is two nice bonuses:

Anyone can drive anyone’s car in Poland (presuming the car is legal of course)
You can take out insurance in your father-in-law’s name to get a cheaper price (just like we used to do in the UK 20 years ago when we were 17 years old)

The vehicle must be insured continuously

In the UK your vehicle needs to be insured if it is on the road. If you don’t have insurance there is nothing wrong with leaving the car in your garage for example. This is not the case in Poland!

IN POLAND YOUR VEHICLE MUST HAVE INSURANCE CONTINUOUSLY regardless of whether it is road-worthy or not or even if it’s parked up on private property.
This means that the day you buy a Polish vehicle you have to make sure it has insurance. If a policy didn’t come with the vehicle for some reason (e.g. because you imported the vehicle) then you have to go and buy insurance THE SAME DAY. I got bitten by this rule. The powers that be have 5 years to check and apparently they can fine you for it.

European Union Harmonisation

There are a number of directives to harmonise car insurance and driving across the EU. See the official Europa website for details. The basics are that any policy you buy in any EU country automatically gives you the minimum required cover in any other EU country (including Iceland, Norway and Switzerland). Green cards are no longer necessary inside the EU.

Levels of cover

In the UK we have 3 levels – 3rd party only, 3rd party fire and theft and fully comprehensive. In Poland from what I have seen they only have the compulsory minimum level of 3rd party (called “OC” which means Odpowiedzialności Cywilnej – civil liability) and fully comp (called “AC” – Autocasco). You can bundle into the package add-ons such as breakdown cover as they do in the UK.

Insurance that comes with the car when you buy it

This is the bit that I still don’t fully understand. In the UK because the cover is with the driver the situation is clear cut – you have your policy, I have mine. Because as mentioned the cover in Poland is with the car, this means that when you buy a car from someone the policy is transferred to you. Well sort of. From what I can work out you have 30 days from when you buy the car to contact the insurance company and change the policy in to your name.

I didn’t change my policy within 30 days and that caused me the following problems:

I was then not able to change the insurance company until the policy expired. Luckily for me the previous owner had used a cheap company
I had to keep the sale contract in the car with me when I drove so that I could show that the name on the insurance policy was the seller and that I had bought the vehicle.

Taking out a new policy

Like in the UK 20 years ago (presumably before people started buying their insurance directly or via the phone and then online) everyone in Poland buys their insurance from agents. You will see them everywhere. They seem almost as prevalent as “Apteka”s in the town centres… Just look for the big sign that says “Ubezpieczenie” (insurance) or the names/logos of the big insurance companies (PZU, Warta).
Recently some companies have been advertising on TV where you can buy direct. Examples include Link 4 and LibertyDirect. Fire up google.pl and you’ll find them easily enough.

No claims-bonus – “zniżki”

In the UK we count how many years of NCB we have, in Poland they ask what percentage you have (e.g. 10, 20, 30%..). Otherwise it works as you would expect – you gain your NCB the longer you have a policy without accidents and you can transfer your NCB if you change your insurance company. You can normally also transfer your NCB from the UK if you produce an NCB certificate translated into Polish. Worth checking if you have a lot of NCB from the UK.

Worth knowing – the GOTCHAs

You must carry your insurance certificate with you all the time
A policy will auto-renew if you do nothing unlike in the UK where it’s up to you to renew it. If you want to change your company make sure you write to them in good time
You must have insurance even if your car is not on the road

Prices

Like in the UK the price varies a lot depending on each case. The two biggest factors in Poland appear to be the engine size and how much NCB (zniżki – “reduction”) you have. But a pleasant suprise is that car insurance seems to be very cheap compared to the UK, especially for motorbikes.
For my Suzuki GSF1200 I paid £600/year in the UK for 3rd, F&T (including my UK NCB). In Poland I paid 135 złoty for OC and didn’t even bother to tell them I had any NCB at all.

Remember too that they still haven’t wised up to the trick of taking the insurance out in some else’s name such as a parent or parent-in-law (choose someone old with a lot of NCB). But to do that the vehicle needs to have this other person listed as a co-owner on the registration document. I did that this morning with my father-in-law so will cover that in my next blog post.

Happy motoring…

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Tags: car insurance, vehicle insurance
Posted in vehicles and driving | 11 Comments »

Summer and Winter tyres

Monday, March 31st, 2008

I hadn’t heard of winter tyres and summer tyres before coming to Poland. I have owned a number of vehicles in the UK (cars, motorbikes and a van) at one time or other and although not a mechanic would like to think I know the basic stuff about looking after vehicles.

So I was a little suprised that in Poland they make a big fuss about having the right tyres on their cars according to the time of year. My first impression was that this was probably a scam by the tyre companies just to shift more tyres. So I did a little bit of research on the Internet and found the following:

In some EU countries (not suprisingly mainly those cold ones up north) such as Finland and Latvia you are legally required to have winter tyres on between certain dates. There are no laws in Poland or the UK as far as I know however.
If you have an accident in Poland and the tyres are considered to be a contributory factor I have heard that this can count against you. But I can’t find any specific rules about it.
The difference between the two types is that they have different rubber compounds and different tread patterns. When the weather is less than 7 degrees winter tyres should be used. Above 7 degrees summer tyres according to www.tyres-online.co.uk
You can get universal ‘all-year-round’ tyres. I guess these are what we use in the UK. They aren’t recommended in Poland.

There is loads of tyre info at www.etyres.co.uk about it if anyone is that sad enough like me to be interested.

When last winter came (2007) I had just bought a car with summer tyres. One day it really snowed and driving in that car I felt like bamby on ice. Whilst drunk. My braking distance was terrible and I couldn’t accelerate away from junctions without wheel-spinning and sliding. The same day I decided that winter tyres probably wasn’t a load of bollocks and went and got some. The difference that same day was evidence enough – I am no longer a sceptic.

Where to buy tyres in Poland?

Every town and village normally has loads of garages that just sell tyres and oil. They are easy to find with the brands advertised outside such as Dębica, Goodyear and Continental. The price depends on the size of course. Fitting and balancing is normally included in the price if you are buying tyres there. If you already have tyres from last year then expect to pay about 10 zloty per tyre for them to change them.

How do I know what tyre size I need?

Easiest way is look on your current tyres and get the same. Tyres are measured according to tredwidth, profile height and wheel diameter and this is written on the side – e.g. 175/65/R14 means tread width is 175mm, profile height is 65% and wheel diameter is 14 inches. It is always written in this format. There is also an alphabetical maximum speed rating. For example H means your tyres are rated for you to drive up to 210 km/h.

Buying tyres online

I was quoted 160 – 170 zloty per tyre for summer tyres from my local garage for tyres made by Sava. I found my size made by Goodride online for 114 zloty and Dębica (a Polish brand but made by Goodyear) for 158 zloty which I ordered from www.oponytanio.pl

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Tags: driving, summer tyres, winter tyres
Posted in life and living, vehicles and driving | 9 Comments »

Must remember to carry my documents!

Friday, February 29th, 2008

I seem to keep blogging about vehicle related stuff, but given that I do a lot of driving over here I guess that can’t be helped.

This is a post about remembering to carry your documents with you when driving in Poland. This is something I find hard to adjust to, I simply never remembered to do so having never had to carry documents in the UK. I know that this is a fairly ‘normal’ requirement, and possibly not unreasonable, but I can’t help also feeling slightly resentful that I have to carry documents with me everywhere I go.

Now that I have a Polish car the registration certficate is a tiny practical thing that comes laminated and handily fits in my wallet so I don’t have to remember it anymore. But when I first came over with my van, my UK documents were of course all A4 and I had them filed away in a safe place.

So anyway one day early in 2007 I was taking the van back to England for another trip to collect more stuff and to sit an exam back in London. My wife came wife me as usual, but along for the ride was my father-in-law who spontaneously thought he might as well take advantage of a free trip to London given that we had a 3rd seat in the van and he had the time free.
We only got about 2 hours down the motorway when we were stopped by Polish customs.
Now I should mention that if you have an old English van and are returning from anywhere in Central/Eastern Europe you are GUARANTEED TO GET STOPPED at least once on your journey. They expect you to be stocked to the ceiling with cheap cigarettes to dodge the duty in the U.K. Polish customs like to set up random stop check points on border routes and I was on the main E40 motorway heading for Germany.

So of course they asked for my driver’s licence, registration certificate and certificate of insurance. I had my licence in my wallet but then remembered that everything else was safely filed away in my filing cabinet back in our flat. The customs guy was incredibly rude. He asked me why on earth I wasn’t carrying my insurance and what would I do in the event of an accident – this seemed like a stupid question to me and I made my reaction obvious – if you have an accident you exchange details and then spend months piddling about with the paperwork later – what difference is there if my policy is physically with me or not? The important thing is whether I have the insurance or not, which I did.

So he searched the van, found nothing of course, then decided to call the police to report me for not having my documents. I wasn’t too fussed at this point, more annoyed that we were being pointlessly delayed, but my wife was going ballistic with me – she couldn’t believe I hadn’t thought about documents. Meanwhile my father-in-law was going a funny colour and looking incredibly stressed. I have learnt now that the older generation of Pole are typically quite afraid and respectful of the authorities, and from the look on his face I thought he was going to have a heart attack about it. So 2 hours later (I couldn’t just drive off as customs were still holding my driver’s licence – believe me, I thought about it) the police arrived. Luckily for me they were two younger and friendly guys who clearly weren’t impressed with customs that they had been called out just for this. Seeing how annoyed my wife still was with me, one of them jokingly offered her his baton and showed her where she should hit me with it to not leave any obvious marks. Then they issued me with the minimum on the spot ticket they could – 50 zloty – and sent us on our way.

Of course when I got to the German border the German customs pulled us aside for another search. “Papiere bitte” they asked. Again my father-in-law turned a funny colour. Again my luck was in – because I can speak German I told them that I had lost my documents (well, a small stretch of the truth) and had already got a ticket for it in Poland but needed to get back to the UK to sort my documents out. The customs officer looked at the amount of the ticket, commented on what good value it was said that in Germany it wouldn’t have been so cheap before sending us on our way again.

Moral of the story – repeat after me: I will always carry my documents with me when driving in Europe.

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Tags: vehicle documents
Posted in bureacracy, life and living, vehicles and driving | No Comments »

How to Buy a Vehicle in Poland

Friday, February 29th, 2008

Finding a car/motorbike

The use of the Internet lags behind the UK somewhat, but it’s still a great place to start looking for vehicles. Have a look at the motoring section on gratka.pl or the most popular Polish auction site allegro.pl.

Like in the UK 10 or more years ago (i.e. pre-Internet) one of the best ways to find a car is to do the leg work and go and visit local dealerships. Also you will often see vehicles parked at the side of the road with “Sprzedam” (for sale – lit. “I will sell”) in the window.

Some useful vocabulary:

przebieg (mileage)
pojemność (engine capacity)
rodzaj paliwa (fuel type)
skrzynia biegów (gear type, i.e. manual or automatic)

It’s worth noting that the price of second-hand vehicles is higher in Poland than in most western European countries such as the UK or Germany. I can only presume this is because there is a higher demand for older cheaper vehicles in Poland which means that vehicles hold their value longer. If you have a trailer and go back and forth by road frequently enough I am sure you could make a sideline importing motorbikes for this very reason. If you have spent any time on the E40 motorway you may well have noticed the amount of crash damaged French/German cars that Poles bring over on trailers.

Lots of Poles I know check out the German market too – have a look at autoscout for example. You might find a cheaper car there, but then of course you have the hassle of going to Germany and then importing the vehicle over here. Also worth a mention is that foreign cars of the same age may well be in better mechanical condition as they haven’t had the extra punishment of the pot-holed Polish roads exerted on them.

Checking the vehicle/test drive

You are pretty much on your own here. There aren’t the checks that you can get in the UK such as AA car check etc.. Also their MOTs don’t show the history of the mileage so you can’t check if the car has been clocked or not. My tips:

Check the car out yourself, bring a mechanically minded friend if necessary.
See if there is a service history.
Check that the engine numbers match the documentation.
Look for signs of an accident damage repaired car by checking the engine bay for unusal marks/damage/weld joints
Look for signs of broken glass under the carpet in the boot (where the spare-wheel is etc..)
Does the car have winter tyres on or summer tyres? You might need to buy a full set depending on the time of year and how long the car’s been parked up

Don’t be afraid to take the car for a test drive. As long as the car’s registration certificate is still up to date you will have the mandatory 3rd party level of insurance so anyone can drive it legally.

Buying the vehicle

Buying is straight-forward except there are some differences:

Most transactions are cash only. Expect to have to go to the bank first!
Get a proper receipt with the seller’s details and your correct details on it – you will need this at the treasury office so don’t lose it
VAT is payable on second-hand cars. You have to go to the treasury department and declare that you bought the car, show the receipt and pay up. If you buy at a dealer they can do this for you to save you the trip. I had to pay 2%. The dealer might not want to put the full value of the transaction on the receipt because they also pay tax on it. It’s up to you if you mind doing that or not.
The seller/dealer will give you the registration certificate. You now have 28 days to get the car registered in your name, which means going twice to the transport department (wywiad transportu i komunikacji)

Registering the vehicle

Take your registration certificate and your certificate that shows you are registered to live in Poland (tymczasowe zameldowanie) to the transport department.

There you will have to queue up and fill out a form (wniosek) that you have bought the car and fill in your details. If I recall correctly I had to pay a fee of 60 złoty. I was lucky that the car I bought had local number plates for the area I lived in. If your car is from a different area to where you want to register it then you will have to buy new number plates and pay 300 złoty. It’s quite a bizarre sight seeing the woman at the counter handing out pairs of shiny new number plates to people.
They will take your registration certificate from you and give you a temporary one valid for 28 days. You will have to return in person to collect the new one after about 2 weeks.

If you are temporarily registered to live in Poland then your registration certificate will have this noted on it and therefore will only be valid whilst your personal registration is valid. Frustratingly you will have to go back to the transport department each time you renew your address registration to get your car registration updated. On a standard temporary address registration that is every 3 months.

Insurance

You have to make sure that the vehicle is insured from the same day you are the registered owner of the vehicle, even if you don’t intend to drive it. It is an offence to own a vehicle in Poland without insurance.

Note that sometimes if your previous owner has a policy still running this normally covers you to drive that vehicle for 30 days, during which time you are supposed to transfer that policy to yourself or sort out a new policy.

See this article for more info on Polish car insurance.

MOT

On the registration certificate is a stamp and date that says when the next vehicle inspection is due – “termin bandania technicznego”. You can go to most garages to get that done and they simply stamp your registration certificate for you. I have to go and get an MOT for my motorbike next week so will update this post then about it.

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Tags: buy car, polish vehicles
Posted in vehicles and driving | 10 Comments »

Driving around in Poland

Thursday, February 28th, 2008

Insurance

One of the nice things about the car registration system in Poland is that unlike 3rd party insurance is included with the annual registration fee, similar to the Australian system.

This makes total sense – you are assured that all drivers have the minimum legally required insurance cover, unlike in London where I see that 1 in 10 drivers aren’t properly insured.

The plus side of this is that you can lend anyone your car as long as they have a valid driver’s licence. Gone to the pub and decided to drink? No problem, let someone else drive back…

Roads

As everybody knows the quality of the roads isn’t great, but what do you expect after years of underinvestment? The money is pouring in from the EU and they are busy building motorway networks. Give it a few more years and the roads won’t be so bad. They’ll just be full of traffic instead.

Overtaking

One of the pleasures (or terrors, depending on how you look at it) of driving over here for me, is the Polish custom for overtaking at any possible place, regardless of road-markings or oncoming traffic. Slow car in front? Overtake them anyway, the slow car will pull to the side to make room for you and the oncoming truck will do the same. Brilliant.

Lights

As of 2007 you have to drive with dipped headlights on 24/7. In previous years this was just required in winter months, now it is obligatory all year round. I know they thought about introducing this at EU level and dropped the idea because the enviromentalists said it would hurt the environment with the extra energy consumption. Personally I think it’s a great idea, it makes vehicles much easier to spot at distance or in bad weather and if that saves lives then it’s worth it.

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Tags: driving, poland
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Number plates stolen in Gdańsk

Thursday, February 28th, 2008

Went to Gdańsk for a lovely few days to see the Baltic coast. My wife and I had borrowed her father’s car to make the trip. We parked it in the city centre and went for a meal one evening. I was quite suprised to come back and discover that someone had stolen our number plates.

Apparently this isn’t such a rare occurence – because Polish number plates start with a 3 letter code that shows which region the owner lives in, it’s easy to spot non-local vehicles. Thieves steal the plates to put on other cars so they can go and tank up on petrol without paying, or worse still, use their car for committing other crimes.

I wasn’t expecting the trouble involved though at the Police station. First we had to sign a warning that we weren’t allowed to drive the car on the road without replacement number plates, but to get the number plates we had to go to Opole (other end of the country) where the vehicle is registered.
Where’s the sense in that? Or am I stupid for even bothering to ask?

Given that we would have been stranded if we’d have left the car we of course drove it back with the registration number written on bits of paper in the windows (something better than nothing I guess). After an uneventful journey on the terrible Polish roads we got back without any further hassle.

The final sting in the tail was that we had to pay out 300 złoty to get new number plates. I guess on the plus side it could have been worse – at least they didn’t steal the car…

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Tags: gdansk, number plates
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Importing a motorbike

Thursday, February 28th, 2008

I already blogged about my attempt at importing my van – basically I couldn’t. Well now having been here a bit longer and with a better grasp of Polish I am ready to tackle importing my motorbike.

Here’s what I did and how long it took. I have written everything down in detail as I did it. The only thing I haven’t mentioned is that the MOMENT YOU GET YOUR TEMPORARY BIKE REGISTRATION YOU ARE OBLIGED TO BUY INSURANCE THE SAME DAY. I found out the hard way – I thought that like in the UK and I presume other countries where logic and commen sense apply, you only need insurance if you want ot use the vehicle. I presumed you don’t need insurance if your vehicle is just sat in the garage. NOT IN POLAND – IF YOU OWN A VEHICLE IT MUST BE INSURED even if it’s off the road for 6 months. I will do another post at some time about insurance because that isn’t so straight forward either…

STEP 1 – TRANSPORT DEPARTMENT- TIME TAKEN: 2 hours

The first thing I did was go to the local office for the department of transport (wydział transportu i komunikacji). I explained to the guy there what I wanted to do, which is basically register my English bike which I bought many years ago in Poland where I am now living and temporarily registered. He told me that I need:

Technical inspection (Badanie techniczne)
Translation of my registration certificate into Polish (tłumaczenie dowodu rejestracyjnego)
VAT declaration from the treasury department (zaświadcienie o zwolnienie z vatu)
Certificate that I am registered in Poland (tymczasowe zameldowanie)

Now they might ask where you are permanently registered to live. If so you will have to explain/argue to them that you aren’t permanently registered in Poland because as a foreigner you can’t be, and that we don’t have such a system/requirement in England.

Also now is a good time to ask where the local translator is. You will have to use an approved translator, so they should either have a list or be able to point you in the right direction. They will definitely know where the German translators are because lots of Poles import cars from Germany. Luckily for me I found an English translator was in the same street.

STEP 2 – TRANSLATION – TIME TAKEN: 45 minutes. Cost 60 zl.

Next I found the English translator to get my registration certificate translated. Had to wait 2 days to collect it and paid 60 złoty. I was charged for 1 and a half pages to do a standard V5C UK registration certificate.

STEP 3 - TREASURY DEPARTMENT VISIT 1 – TIME TAKEN: 45 minutes

Next I went to the treasury department (urząd skarbowy). Unfortunately in Poland you have to report to them everytime you borrow money, lend money, buy a car or fart. I found the department responsible for VAT and explained to them that I want to import my English bike.
They asked for my receipt from when I bought it – documents like this are extremely important in Poland, unlike the UK, where you don’t need to report all financial transactions. This was my first major problem. I had to explain that I bought the bike many years ago from a friend and don’t have a receipt. After a lot of head scratching and phone calls she decided that I had to return with:

form VAT-24 - this is a form about importing a vehicle from abroad and paying VAT on it (yes that’s right – unlike the UK in Poland you pay VAT on second hand vehicles)
form NIP-3 – this is a form so that I can get a Polish NIP number so that the treasury department can then keep tabs on me
a declaration (oświadczenie) signed by me, in Polish, that I bought the bike 4 years ago in the UK where I was living, I used the bike in Poland and I brought the bike to Poland when I moved here.

STEP 4 - TECHNICAL INSPECTION – TIME TAKEN: 1hr. Cost 116 zl.

Time to find a garage where I can get my technical inspection done. I did ask at the transport department but they said that almost all garages do these inspections. I asked at a local tyre shop where I know the owner and he told me about a local garage where they do technical inspections – stacja kontroli pojazdów. I went there and after scratching their heads for a bit, looking at the headlights and looking at my polish translation of my registration certificate they decided they couldn’t do it because ‘they don’t have the data for this motorbike’. What that means exactly I don’t know – maybe they don’t usually do motorbikes or maybe they weren’t confident about doing a foreign vehicle. They suggested another (bigger) garage locally.

So a month later with the weather having warmed up a bit more I went to the second garage. I asked the bloke if he could do an inspection on an English bike and he said sure no problem. He spent about 5 seconds looking at the bike, asked me to show him that all the lights worked and then asked me to follow him inside. To my suprise he sat there for a few minutes and then gave me two certificates:

“Dokument Identyfikacyjny Pojazdu zarejestrowanego po raz pierwszy za granicą“, meaning something along the lines of “ID document for foreign vehicle registered for the first time in Poland”. It has a list of 40 technical points on it such as country of production, country of previous registration etc..
Zaświadczenie o przeprowadzonym badaniu technicznym pojazdu which is basically the MOT certificate.

So it appears that if you can find a garage happy to do the paperwork then as long as your vehicle looks like it doesn’t have any wheels missing and has got lights then this step isn’t a problem. Cost 116 zloty.

STEP 5 – TREASURY DEPARTMENT VISIT 2 – TIME TAKEN: 1 hr. Cost 160 zl.

Went back to the treasury department with my forms filled out as best as I could. The woman at the VAT window was expecting me following my first visit there, so had been informed by her colleagues about the English guy with his motorbike and thankfully I didn’t have to explain everything all over again. She was very helpful and helped me correct my forms. I had to go to a 2nd window to hand in my NIP form, then to the till window to pay a flat fee of 160 złoty. I haven’t quite worked out what that fee was for, I guess for the priviledge of importing a vehicle to Poland. Also for some reason the first till window sent me to the 2nd till window (more queuing), and she did something on the computer then sent me back to the 1st till window to pay (more queuing). Where the logic is in that I don’t know…
After paying I went back the the VAT window, showed her my payment receipt and she told me to come back in 2 days to collect my declaration (oświadczenie) to show I have taken care of the VAT for this vehicle.

STEP 6 – TREASURY DEPARTMENT – VISIT 3 – TIME TAKEN: 10 minutes

As instructed I went back to collect my confirmation that they are happy with the VAT for this bike and they gave me a form called a VAT-25 which they had typed up and put official looking stamps and signatures on. Suprisingly it was there waiting for me and there was no queue. Brilliant.

STEP 7 – TRAN
SPORT DEPARTMENT- VISIT 2 – TIME TAKEN: 1 hour. Cost 188 zl.

Went back to the transport department with all of my documents. Was told that I couldn’t register the bike today because I hadn’t made an appointment. Gave him a sob-story about having a little baby at home and sick wife. Was told to fill out the registration form (wniosek), go to the till and pay 188 zloty. After 15 minutes he emerged with:

Temporary vehicle permit (pozwolenie czasowe)
My VAT-25 form with a stamp on it that it has been used to register the vehicle
A photocopy of my UK registration certificate again with stamps on it
A shiny new number plate!

Unfortunately because my temporary residence registration runs out in 2 weeks time I have to go back again then to collect the regular vehicle permit.

STEP 8 – TRANSPORT DEPARTMENT- VISIT 3 – TIME TAKEN: 10 minutes

Got my new temporary residence certificate so returned to the transport department. I was pleasently surprised to find no queue and a helpful attendant. After just a few minutes I got my karta pojazdu and permit no problem. FINISHED!

TOTAL COST: 524 zloty and 6 hours of time

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Tags: import, motorycle, poland, vehicle
Posted in bureacracy, vehicles and driving | 11 Comments »

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Poland again refuses RHD cars

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