Photo request VIN Plate

marlin758 · Post by **marlin758** » Wed Jan 16, 2013 9:10 am

3 years ago I bought a 55 plate E53 , transferred a private plate to it . Had a full HPI check etc.

2 months ago I had a request for a DVLA vehicle inspection. When I asked what the problem was I was told that another E53 had turned up in another part of the country with the same VIN , they checked mine and thought it was genuine , said it could be a clerical error .

A month later I had a request for a police vehicle inspection. They too thought the vehicle was ok but took details off various parts of the car to cross check with BMW UK.

I then received a phone call from the police saying it was a stolen , cloned vehicle !

They sent a low loader and took it away.

I have now purchased MY ! car back from the insurance company who it legally belonged to.
Not ideal but I know the car and it was the cheapest option !

However I now have to get the correct VIN number restored and have a VOSA vehicle identity check before I can get a V5 for the car.

I can get the VIN number stamped on the inner wing redone and the police have told me how to do the one under the windscreen.

My problem is the VIN plate stuck on the left inner wing - I can get one done but I don't know what information was on the plate - I was wondering if someone with a 55 plate ( preferably silver ) could take a photo of their VIN plate ? My counterfeit one was stuck on the left inner wing approx 30 cm back from the front.

Please delete your own VIN on the photo - I already have 2 >:(

Thanks in anticipation

Terry

Imy · Post by **Imy** » Wed Jan 16, 2013 9:33 am

Ouch, I can only imagine how unpleasant that must have been for you!
How were the thieves able to get hold of a V5? and i assume the car then had no service history old MOT's etc?

Hopefully someone will be able to help you on here soon enough and aleast you were able to get your motor back...

marlin758 · Post by **marlin758** » Wed Jan 16, 2013 9:45 am

Hi

No , it wasn't very nice - particularly having to buy the same car twice !

The car was stolen in 2008 - I believe that there were a lot of blank V5's stolen around then but have no idea how they obtained a genuine one as apparently this should have shown up as soon as I registered the car in my name !

I owned the car for two and a half years before it showed up . No-one can understand why . In which time the dealer I had bought it off had gone bust too !

It had some documentation including some service history but the car had been cloned so expertly I wonder how genuine this was ? It had an MOT History back to 2008 , which is when it's first MOT would have been due and tax discs back to 2008 !

Also the HPI check showed everything ok but as stated in the HPI small print they only guarantee their data for the registration that you give them so if the car is cloned then they are checking the wrong car !

Imy · Post by **Imy** » Wed Jan 16, 2013 1:14 pm

Your experience highlights the level of sofistication thieves are now using...

I hope you managed to get a good chunk of discount from the insurance company to buy back!

marlin758 · Post by **marlin758** » Wed Jan 16, 2013 2:04 pm

Well , I paid almost £17,000 for it the first time and I have paid almost £7,000 the second time .

The insurance company came up with a figure of around £10,000 as Glass's trade price , then quoted 85% of that as what they would get from their Salvage Company and deducted £2000 for getting VIN sorted out etc !

Not cheap but the options were look for another and they are selling for much more than £7,000 at the moment so it was bite the bullet and buy the same car twice !

Another query I have is could someone tell me approx what size their VIN number is stamped on the top of the suspension strut ?

My son has a 5 series and his are approx 10mm high characters , a friend has an X3 and his are 10 mm high characters but mine were more like 15 mm high . Is this normal on the X5 or is that how the thieves obliterated the original VIN ?

Raj · Post by **Raj** » Wed Jan 16, 2013 3:01 pm

I really feel for you mate. That is really bad and I'm surprised it has taken so long to come up.

Having to stump up an extra £7k is not good at all.

jaynana · Post by **jaynana** » Wed Jan 16, 2013 6:34 pm

seriously feel for you mate. mine's a 04 plate not a 55, if you still want the vin from the left wing inner pls pm me your email.

re. HPI anyways, my mate had an accident on his 330ci last year april. it was repaired by insurance. HPI to-date comes out as all clear - no accidents! isn't that one of their checks?

marlin758 · Post by **marlin758** » Wed Jan 16, 2013 7:33 pm

pm sent

I would have thought that insurance repairs would be on but not sure - police took all my documentation away , they are in the process of returning them at the moment .

Thanks

X5Sport · Post by **X5Sport** » Wed Jan 16, 2013 9:15 pm

[quote="Imy"]
Ouch, I can only imagine how unpleasant that must have been for you!
How were the thieves able to get hold of a V5?
[/quote]

Not good. How did they find the 'right' VIN, or did you get a new official one?

Thousands of V5 blanks were stolen a few years back and the DVLA are now in the process of replacing the same series as was stolen, along with all other V5s with the new Red version. It's been ongoing for a little while and there are millions that need replacing.

marlin758 · Post by **marlin758** » Wed Jan 16, 2013 11:07 pm

Apparently BMW identified the original VIN from the serial numbers off the wiring loom and various bits of the car

B1G JV · Post by **B1G JV** » Thu Jan 17, 2013 12:34 pm

I thought the original VIN was stored in the computer and couldn't be changed?

marlin758 · Post by **marlin758** » Thu Jan 17, 2013 1:15 pm

As far as I know it is but I don't think the police or DVLA thought of that !

marlin758 · Post by **marlin758** » Sun Jan 20, 2013 9:52 am

Well that's the VIN plate sorted - thanks Jaynana !

Black X5 · Post by **Black X5** » Sun Jan 20, 2013 10:15 am

Most major parts of the car would have the original vin on them anyway. (E.g wiring loom, dashboard etc)- as cars are built using Just in Time manufacturing.

Also could get it through the OBC, any of the various modules and finally if all else fails (or the thieves have been really professional) link up the body number to the vin.

Body number is stamped somewhere inconsipcuous, and although is totally different to the VIN- can be used to link forward to it. On RRs and Discos it is behind one of the wheel arch liners.

It's a bit different to the old days where you only had had an engine number, riveted VIN plate and stamped VIN on the body.

Glad you got it sorted after all the problems. Still surprised it took them so long to work out that it was a cloned car though...

marlin758 · Post by **marlin758** » Sun Jan 20, 2013 11:27 am

I can't figure out how they got a 'genuine' V5 for it !

When I bought the car I paid a deposit and the dealer gave me the V5 so that I could transfer my personal plate before picking the car up.

The new V5 came back from Swansea with new Tax Disc and the form to get number plates made up , MOT stamped with change of registration etc.

All I can think is that the other 'genuine' car was in Aberdeen and that the owner was working offshore or the car had been out of the country for a while .

I had a funny conversation with a guy at the DVLA when I rang them about it . He was adamant that I had just taxed my car and I was adamant that the tax didn't expire until the end of the following month.

So presumably the owner in Aberdeen taxing the genuine one had kicked off the query .

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