Car Finance Check

You can get a car history check to instantly check if a car has outstanding finance.

Simply enter the vehicle registration to find out in minutes if the car you're looking to buy has any outstanding finance.

If you buy a car with outstanding finance, it’s still technically owned by the finance company.

If you purchase the vehicle in good faith, and you weren’t aware of the finance agreement, you can still keep the vehicle, but there may be extra hassle involved when the finance company realise that the vehicle has been sold.

There are also different rules depending on if you purchased the vehicle privately, or from a dealer.

Overall it’s best to check the finance status of a vehicle prior to purchasing to avoid any extra headaches.

If a vehicle shows has having outstanding finance, it’s important to do some extra checks before making the decision to go ahead with your purchase.

You should contact the finance company and get clarification on the finance status. If the balance has recently been settled it may still show on the report.

If the finance agreement is still in place, you would need to speak with the seller and come to an agreement about how the balance would be cleared. This could be done by the seller in advance of the sale, or you could pay the balance to the finance company, with any remaining funds paid to the seller.

Either way it’s important to ensure that the finance agreement is settled to prevent any future issues.

You will need to purchase a full car history check to find out if there are any finance agreements recorded against a vehicle. We provide a full report which includes a finance check for £9.99.

The full report also includes a £30,000 data guarantee for extra peace of mind.

A finance check indicates if any finance agreements are currently secured against a vehicle. It also includes other information which could be useful in confirming the current finance status, such as the name and contact number of the finance company along with the agreement number and type of agreement.

A full report also includes other important data checks which highlight potential issues when purchasing a used vehicle, for example, if the vehicle is written off or is recorded as stolen.

With a hire purchase agreement, the customer pays monthly payments until the balance of the vehicle is paid off in full.

This is similar to a conditional sale, in which the customer will own the vehicle outright at the end of the finance term.

With a PCP agreement, the customer pays monthly payments, but still needs to pay a final lump sum at the end of the payment term in order to own the vehicle.

At the end of the term, the customer can either return the vehicle, or pay the final ballon payment.

Car dealers often use unit stocking agreements to finance the vehicles on their forecourt.

This allows them to keep a wider range of stock for sale.