When buying a second hand car there are many services online that you can use to establish the history of the vehicle. Most of us are familiar with the HPI report system where you can find out if a car has had a number plate change, been subject to a write off, been recorded as stolen or has outstanding finance of it, but did you also know you can look up old MOT’s online.

Once you have the make and reg number of the vehicle, you can go on to the MOT government website and recover a list of the current and previous MOT’s. The report will show you the mileage at the time, the date and expiry date of the MOT, if the car passed or failed (if it failed, what it failed on), and advisories.

Although this is not fool proof it should give you an indication as to what work has been done over the last few years and what has been noted on previous MOT’s as advisories that may require attention in the near future.