Friday 19 April 2013

Getting Things Done The French Way 2

A few weeks ago I posted about getting my Toyota Hilux registered in French - Getting Things Done The French Way.  The document required is called a 'Carte Gris'.  And on and off the saga has continued.

Having heard nothing back from Toyota I decided that it would be easier to go to the Prefecture to find what I needed to do.  Here I was told I only had a partial certificate to conformity and because of this I had to take the vehicle to a place called DREAL in Caen.  This is a government department that inspects the vehicle to see that it conforms.  So on asking why I had to take it there considering I had all the relevant paperwork I was told 'because it says on this letter'! Not an extremely helpful reply.


Rosie rang DREAL up to ask what the situation is and reads the letter out to the man there. He says it is do with the headlights having to be changed.  Rosie explained that we had a CT (MOT) so the lights must conform.  This seemed to confuse the man and you could feel the shrug down the phone.  But he said we would have to fill out a form, which he duly emailed us, and send all the documents to him (with a cheque for 90 euros).

For us, when dealing with these things, it is sometimes easier to go in, in person, with the documents. So off I go to DREAL in Caen, with all the paperwork.  The man was very helpful but now said I needed to go to a Toyota dealer to have the lights checked and an 'astestation' to confirm they are correct. Even though I have a CT confirming they are correct this still wasn't good enough.

We rung the local Toyota dealer and explained the situation , only to be told that only a full dealership could deal with this matter and that they were only a concession.  The nearest dealer is in  Alençon, about 1½ hours away - which incidentally led to me last post 'I Have Succumbed!!'.

Here I explained the situation and I'm glad to say they were bemused by the whole thing.  You have a CT so the vehicle must comply.  They also didn't understand why they had the check the lights again.  They were extremely helpful and did have the headlights checked.  They rung to check that the actual unit was the same for right or left hand drive cars.  Finally one of the mechanics phoned DREAL up - told them the lights comply and so they were told to get me to send in all the documents, all with a shrug and 'no, we don't know why you had to come here either'.

Now all the paperwork has gone of in the post to DREAL (with the cheque) and we are left with a feeling of 'what will be next?'

1 comment :

  1. He he! Welcome to French admin! It gets us all in the end. Only solution is to patient and shrug back!

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