Registering a Honda Motorcycle in France

I'm surprised you have to bother the French seem to ignore all other types of rules!

I know there are import companies (into Britain) would they not be able to help in reverse so to speak?
Or possibly by way of specialist Estate agents,they usually have a handle on the "what you need to do" things.

Sorry Adam,

Called up my bike enthusiast friends, who said that they have had friends with similar problems. Basically the easiest thing to do is to get a C de C from the French importer, also you may also need to have the power of the bike restricted to comply with French law, headlamp will need to be modified, and if the speedo doesn't show kph, will have to be changed.

They seem to think your bike doesn't have a CNIT because it isn't currently road legal in France...

Hope this helps!


Dom

Thanks for that - You'd think Honda UK might have come up with an answer over 3 months.

No problem, you really would think even if they couldn't be bothered to find out themselves they would have at least passed you on to Honda in France. I hope it doesn't take too long to get it sorted, I would be very annoyed to have to leave something like that in the garage any longer now the weather is getting good!

Who said Adam has left his bike in the garage?

Are you actually after a French reg? Can you not leave it on a British reg?

why not sell the gb reg and buy a french reg bike....? or am i missing something here!

Yes to all the above - I HAD thought of selling and buying here, no - you cannot leave it as UK registered and ... I DID ask Honda UK to pass my query over to Honda France.

I went for the registration here as the initial parts went so well - even visiting the Hotel d'impôts with my dodgy French and inadequate paperwork. The usual No - it's impossible - followed by the whole process being nicely fudged to make me go away.

I have to give Honda an absolute zero for customer services - especially their complete lack of even a quick negative answer.

Does Honda they have a forum where you can go and vent in public?

It wouldn't achieve anything but you could join the public venting crowd!

Cheers

Jim

quote:

Originally posted by Adam Meredith:
no - you cannot leave it as UK registered

I can leave my car UK-registered I have been informed. As long as it remains completely legal in one EU member country, it is legal in France, - the 'six months to re-register' thing only applies if you take French residency and don't keep your UK driving licence. Then what changes, legality-wise, is not the status of the vehicle, but your personal status.

Obviously for me re-registering a right-hand drive car in France is a not-great thing to do as its resale value would plummet. Makes little difference when driving as the French - it seems to me - have no sense whatsoever of 'side of the road' anyway.

In practice for me this means I need to return to the UK with the car once a year to have it MOT'd and I need to use a UK insurance company that will issue a 12-month 'Green Card' (only one such that I have found, although ironically it's a French AXA underwritten policy). I need also to buy/maintain UK tax. All of this is cheaper than re-registering as insurance is much more expensive here, and transferring a car to French reg involves the Fiscal CV related sales tax (mine is old, but 4 litre).

The fact that speeding camera 'attention' doesn't seem to journey successfully from France and back via Swansea obviously has nothing to do with my decision to keep the status quo, even though it means a 1600 mile trip once a year.

E-mail me if you'd like the details of this insurance broker and maybe you can leave your bike UK registered, if that would be a plan for you.

Cheers

Rod

quote:

Originally posted by scottyhammer:
why not sell the gb reg and buy a french reg bike....? or am i missing something here!

Surely a left-hand drive bike would be safer in France anyway?

I'll get me coat