Drivers are being warned to watch out for scammers targeting motorists ahead of the vehicle excise duty (VED) increases.
From April 1 , EV drivers will be facing VED costs for the first time, as well as standard rate charges for petrol and diesel cars increasing too. But as drivers prepare to pay these new costs, there’s a risk in the rise of VED payment scams.
Rhydian Jones, from car insurance company Confused.com, is now warning motorists to be on the lookout for potential scams.
He said: “Since the budget, drivers are coming to terms with the increase in VED in any new petrol or diesel cars purchased next year, as well as new standard rate charge increases for all internal combustion engine (ICE) cars. The Chancellor has brought this decision in to widen the gap between electric and ICE vehicles, as EVs will only have to pay £10 in VED from next year. The hope is that this will encourage more drivers to buy green instead.
“However, some drivers are being tricked by VED payment requests which are in fact scams, and are being warned to avoid these.”
Here’s what you should look out for if you think you might have received a scam:
- Check your records before making any payments. This way, if you receive an email at a time of year not close to your renewal date, you will know not to pay it.
- Look out for any spelling mistakes or strange formatting in the email
- Often times, scams come from strange email addresses that don’t correlate with an official address.
Rhydian added: “If you do end up clicking a link from a scam email or text, you could end up losing a lot of money. Always be vigilant, your car tax need to be renewed once per year and drivers can use our tax checker tool to see if their car is taxed and how long it has left. That way, you are less likely to fall for any unexpected notifications that could be trying to catch you out.”