Panic! French reg car in London LEZ

SmithsInFrance

SmithsInFrance

Joined
Sep 2, 2016
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Since 2015
We are in the U.K. in our french registered car and unexpectedly find we will need to drive into the London LEZ zone on Sunday.

Looks a right rigmarole to register the car, especially using a mobile phone 😣.

Any suggestions? I’m reluctant to start the process too far in case we are better off just winging it?

Help!!
 
Could you park outside and go in on the tube or even the train?
 
Depends what the car is. It may be sufficiently'clean' to be OK, but as has been suggested, the tube might be easier. Drive ng in central London is hardly a delight.

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Don't wing it
My friend did not realise he a had to register. German car imported to france.
Fine arrived 1 year later 180 euro
 
SmithsInFrance said:
Thanks all so much for the suggestions and information, especially Riverbankannie 🤩

Got until Sunday to decide what to do but tempted to give it a miss, just too much hassle.

So that’s another few hundred quid we will be saving and that’s not going into the London economy…
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Best thing to do in any caz scam zones is to avoid and go elsewhere.
 
I've posted in other threads about how this is going to become a real thing for all drivers but especially out-of-towners like us MH users who want to visit. In Catalunya, Barcelona has a ZBE which is Catalan for LEZ and the goalposts have been moving relating to when and where it works - all non-Spanish vehicles that enter it during operation must be registered. The requirement was extended by the Catalan government to cover any town with more than 50,000 inhabitants, which was supposed to have come into operation earlier this year, but which the town halls couldn't put the infrastructure in place for in time. This means that your larger Costa Brava towns like Tarragona and Mataro as well as many interior towns closer to Barcelona are going to have ZBEs and I predict a slew of breaches and fines being issued. It won't be happening this season but it's coming down the road towards us...
 
LONDON THE DAY AFTER THE CORRINATION !! not sure if thats brave or ................................
 
Nanniemate said:
LONDON THE DAY AFTER THE CORRINATION !! not sure if thats brave or ................................
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Trouble is, it isn’t even central London, it’s only Chiswick but still in the zone 😢
 
PaulOH said:
I've posted in other threads about how this is going to become a real thing for all drivers but especially out-of-towners like us MH users who want to visit. In Catalunya, Barcelona has a ZBE which is Catalan for LEZ and the goalposts have been moving relating to when and where it works - all non-Spanish vehicles that enter it during operation must be registered. The requirement was extended by the Catalan government to cover any town with more than 50,000 inhabitants, which was supposed to have come into operation earlier this year, but which the town halls couldn't put the infrastructure in place for in time. This means that your larger Costa Brava towns like Tarragona and Mataro as well as many interior towns closer to Barcelona are going to have ZBEs and I predict a slew of breaches and fines being issued. It won't be happening this season but it's coming down the road towards us...
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That’s really interesting, thank you. We go to Spain and the Barcelona area particularly very regularly and weren’t aware of this.
Do you have to apply for a LEZ badge for each city separately or does one suffice nationwide?

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SmithsInFrance said:
Trouble is, it isn’t even central London, it’s only Chiswick but still in the zone 😢
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Park in Reading and get the train in or even Didcot I think the parking there is free , slough has a train station not sure about parking but it very close the that big castle where there a concert going on 🏰👑👑
 
SmithsInFrance said:
That’s really interesting, thank you. We go to Spain and the Barcelona area particularly very regularly and weren’t aware of this.
Do you have to apply for a LEZ badge for each city separately or does one suffice nationwide?
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As far as I know you need to apply separately for Barcelona and there's another one in Madrid. The one in Valencia is apparently going to start working sometime this year and it'll begin in January 2024 in Malaga.

Only Spanish registered vehicles can qualify for the graded etiqueta ambiental indicating access privileges, and any petrol vehicle older than 2000 or diesel older than 2006 cannot qualify for any etiqueta. There are no exceptions for residents, historic or commercial vehicles and people who live within the ZBE in Barcelona can qualify for a grant if they sell their car.

I understand that non-etiqueta and foreign registered vehicles wanting to enter the Barcelona ZBE during its operation - it's not a 24-7 thing - need to register (not a particularly straightforward thing either), and then apply in advance for one of 10 annual exemptions lasting 24 hours. Otherwise a fine of €200 will be issued, reduced by 50% if paid within a certain time period.

If they can track an offending French vehicle and get a fine to them from London, then they'll probably be able to do the same from Spain. I haven't heard of any similar situations with the Barcelona ZBE though.

It isn't clear how this is going to operate for us MH users when every town of more than 50,000 inhabitants has a ZBE. I suppose these won't be 24-7 either and many on the forum wouldn't really want to drive a big vehicle into a cramped daytime city street anyway so perhaps the actual impact won't be so great.

My concern would be accidentally entering a ZBE on your way to a Centre Commercial for shopping, fuel or gas, or simply missing the sign and driving into trouble through ignorance - though it is well-signposted in Barcelona.

The ZBE in Barcelona began smaller than it is today and wasn't as restrictive - the grading of the etiqueta means vehicles which have the lowest kind recently lost their ZBE access, and there's talk of extending the area it covers further for non-etiqueta vehicles - doubtless there will be confusion over who and where it applies when these and other ZBE developments happen.
 
In our case the TFL website would not accept our NZ email address to register. So if you register use a Gmail or UK web address . We winged it and got 3 fines 4 months later from EPIC the TFL collection outfit.
They would not reply to any email we sent , but were happy to send a new and increased fine to pay.
They have a german office and bank account , thus giving them access to your French registration detail.
This gives them the Emission class they would need to sort out if your vehicle could pass through the LEZ.
They don't use that , instead continue to harass you hoping you will pay up to get rid of them.
We appealed to the Mayor of Londons office. They were excellent ,sorted it quickly and remitted all charges.
So take the train or bus it easier and no hassles.
 
Quick update - we weren’t going into central London, but Wimbledon and Chiswick. Seems these are in the new extended LEZ so we should be ok.
The tfl website doesn’t make it clear at all that the new scheme isn’t yet operational but at least we will have time to work out how to register before we come back next year.
Thanks again to everyone for all your help 👍
 
SmithsInFrance said:
Quick update - we weren’t going into central London, but Wimbledon and Chiswick. Seems these are in the new extended LEZ so we should be ok.
The tfl website doesn’t make it clear at all that the new scheme isn’t yet operational but at least we will have time to work out how to register before we come back next year.
Thanks again to everyone for all your help 👍
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You may still get a letter inviting you to pay be warned its not a bill read it carefully if it turns up.

I got one when they first were introducing the zones .I thought um I don't need to pay. Then checked again a very well written and totally legal 'scam'

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Nanniemate said:
You may still get a letter inviting you to pay be warned its not a bill read it carefully if it turns up.

I got one when they first were introducing the zones .I thought um I don't need to pay. Then checked again a very well written and totally legal 'scam'
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Thanks for the heads up. That is totally not surprising really because the whole website etc seems designed to be impossible for foreign vehicles (don’t know about U.K. ones to be fair)
 
SmithsInFrance said:
Thanks for the heads up. That is totally not surprising really because the whole website etc seems designed to be impossible for foreign vehicles (don’t know about U.K. ones to be fair)
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Mine is UK cheeky so n sos
 

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