mandalar blog

In December 2009, my old BMW was written off after an accident. That meant I needed to buy a car. A friend of mine told me why not try a brand new car, pointing out that it did not need MOT in first 3 years and the manufacturer’s warranty would be a peace of mind. Of course, I want to. But i feel an extra bill for finance would be a great burden in next 3-4 yeas. Moreover, the market price of a new car will drop by £3000-4000 in the first year, according to the reports. So I decided to go for a used car.

I’m still missing this BMW 316. It was a good runner.

Buying a car is not an easy business if you have more and more knowledge about it. I meant when I bought my first car, I did not know anything behind the sale of a car and I did not check anything. I did a test drive and I purchased straight away. Fortunately, there was no problem.

This time, first of all, I did research on Autotraders and Gumtree. After sometime, I had got an idea about current price. Once I was interested in a car, I rang first. If still available, I made an appointment to view. At this point, in terms of documents, I needed to check if VIN (Vehicle Identification number ) on car body matched with the one on log book (Vehicle registration book). If not matched, it is likely a clone car. The owner should be the same address as shown on the log book of the car. A regular service history meant that this car was likely to be well maintained . I can also get a rough idea about mileage. Yes, mileage fraud is relatively common here. I also made sure any annoying things inside and outside of the car. MOT certificate is also an important document.

Next step was checking the car history on HPI or DVLA’s Car data. This small investment is worth doing so. Yes, basically, I would avoid the car with bad history, such is outstanding finance, previous damage and stolen vehicles. I also do not the car with history of plate transfer for some reason.

After those were satisfactory, I made an offer to reduce the price by 100 or 200£.

Basically, private sellers want cash. I was told before someone was beaten and money was taken when he was buying car. So for a safety measure, I needed to get my friends when I went to purchase this Mercedes.

I intended to buy a Mercedes C class 3 doors coupe’ (C200 or C180) previously because it is affordable with a nice looking to me. But once I tried to buy, those cars had been sold quickly while I was working week days and some weekends. As a result, I did not have a car in last 3 weeks. Fortunately, after the new year night, I found out new advert about this car while I was in London for the New year celebration at riverside and we reached a deal quickly. But it is a family car.

I bought this yesterday

Update (03/01/2010 23:00hr)

Some experience and knowledge obtained while trying to buy a car.

1. The registration number of a car advertised by a small trade was not found in the HPI. When I rang about that, they gave me another number which was also not found in the database system. I have not idea what they were trying to do.

2 A couple of sellers advertised the mileage much less than actual one.

3. One Mercedes with cheap price was written off in the record. That means ?a major accident in the past.

4. If the number plate was transferred, it is said that the full history of car is unable to be traced.

5. Mileage history is important. we can check it on old MOT certificates and service history.

6. 3 door coupé cars are on demand.

7. One dealer advertised a car, saying owner was a doctor. Weird!

8. VIN (Vehicle Identification number/ chassis number ) has 17 digits. There are no alphabet O and I. but O is Zero and I is one.

9. If the MOT certificate is lost, you can get a duplicate copy, costing you £10.

Today is Boxing day, so most shops are closed. But a few shops are trying to clear unsold items with so-called discount prices. For example, I bought a pair of discount shoes (£55) from Jones bootmaker. It’s original price was £85. In fact, people are talking about Boxing day discounts much more than actually it happens.

Well, today I popped in Canary Wharf which is business and shopping complex in East London area and bought above shoes. I took a couple of photos as my hobby.

You may notice a CCTV in the photo. The news papers claimed that everyday, average Londoners are filmed by CCTVs for over 200 times on the street, on the bus, on the tube, in the stores and so on. In public places, your activities may be recorded from different angles all the time as millions of CCTVs are working 24/7 across the UK. If you parked your car on the double yellow lines or restricted area, nobody does not seem to be care. You would be happy as no police man and no traffic warden disturbed you. But you will get a £60 penalty notice in next few days. You car has been framed by local council CCTV. Definitely.

So a lobby of people have a concern about a matter of privacy issue. But the number of CCTVs has been increasing all the time across Britain, especially after 7/7 terrorist attack in London. Since then, all London buses have got CCTVs. In fact, I also fixed a couple of hidden security cameras at my place. One is for my car and one is for the main door. But these are not CCTV. I record only when I need.

This is the view from Poplar rail station. HSBC tower, Bank of America building and Canary Wharf tower. I just took this photo in time before ?changing ownership after credit crunch. In fact, whoever the ownership is, those buildings sprang up by means of British tax payer’s money, I think.
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Lately, I moved to south west England from West Yorkshire. It is Dorset. For me, I haven’t got a chance to explore it. Struggling with new job, new environment and new people. Everything is different here. Many doctors start working from 8:30 AM till 6-7 PM. (9-5 is normal working hours if we don’t have any on-call duty).

Basically, I can live in Yorkshire while working in a very friendly and flexible atmosphere. But after sometime, I felt really bored. So started checking to move somewhere else. I found this post which is really exciting. Chest medicine. So I applied and attended an interview. I was offered the post. I took it. As a consequence, the tiring business starts running despite salary is only £1000 different a year. But it is only 130 miles away from London, my fav place.

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Sometime Britain is confusing with different names and usages. For example, many people from far east would not be so clear between the UK, Great Britain, Britain and England. Basically, the United Kingdom is mainly formed by four countries, England, Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland. Some Books say Britain usually refers the main island, but in case of Great Britain, more territories, that is, Northern Ireland, Channels Islands and the Isle of Man are added (Ref: Life in the United Kingdom).

But more logical approach of explanation according to a web site is that the UK means a combination of 4 countries. The Great Britain means England, Wales and Scotland. Britain means England and Wales. The name Britain was derived from Britannia. Romans who ruled and introduced the civilization in the British islands during approximately 55BC and 400AD named it “Britannia Major”. “Britannia Minor” was in France.

According to the book (Life in the UK), if Scots and Welsh are asked “What is your citizenship”, they will answer “British”. and if asked “What is your nationality”, they will reply “Scottish” and “Welsh”. For the native-born English, they will answer “British” to both questions.

I ask myself what my citizenship is and what my nationality is.