Is Your Car Roadworthy For Insurance?

By Author: Adam Petford
Total Articles: 6
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Just like airlines would never board passengers into a plane that hasn’t been fully checked, and you wouldn’t trust an unlicensed doctor with your health, you don’t want to drive a vehicle that isn’t roadworthy. A roadworthy certificate is a document which proves that your vehicle has passed a roadworthy test, which will be administered by an authorised roadworthy inspector.

The word “test” might give you the cold sweats thinking of your high school or uni exam days, but this is a super important test which is designed to make sure that your vehicle is actually suitable for driving on the road as per Department of Transport guidelines. Vehicles have to pass certain criteria points; the inspector will check out areas such as tyres, brakes, steering, suspension, body (looking for damage or rust), windscreen and lights.

Depending on where in Australia you live, the circumstances where you need a roadworthy certificate may vary; as a yardstick, let’s look at the Department of Transport Queensland. In Queensland, light vehicles don’t require compulsory periodic ...
... inspection, but some other vehicles (heavy vehicles, tow trucks, etc.) do. However, you may be subject to random inspection, or you may receive a defect notice (often known by its nickname, “yellow sticker”) requiring a roadworthy inspection. In QLD, a safety certificate is required in the following circumstances:

* A registered light vehicle is offered for sale in Queensland, or
* Transferring registration to a new owner, or
* When transferring to Queensland registration from another state or territory, or
* When re-registering an unregistered vehicle.

Vehicles requiring a safety certificate are:

* Cars
* Motorcycles
* Trailers (including caravans) with an aggregate trailer mass (ATM) between 750kg and 3,500kg
* Any other vehicles up to 4,500kg gross vehicle mass (GVM).

From an insurance perspective, the roadworthy certificate is important because it takes place when the process of registering or re-registering a vehicle takes place. You won’t be able to get your vehicle registered without a safety certificate; your vehicle needs to be registered if you’re going to be driving it on the road; and we doubt that you’ll be able to get insurance coverage on an unregistered vehicle driven on the road!

It’s important to note that a roadworthy certificate inspection is not equivalent to a comprehensive mechanical inspection; it won’t tell you about the quality, or life expectancy of a vehicle, so it’s still quite possible to buy a second-hand “lemon” that’s technically roadworthy. So if you are buying a used vehicle, it’s best to get a comprehensive mechanical inspection.

Curious about what criteria are covered by the Vehicle Inspection Guidelines? You can actually find the entire criteria under the Vehicle Inspection Guidelines for light vehicles in QLD here - it’s a fascinating read!

From the Department of Transport’s perspective, it’s important that all vehicles pass these basic roadworthy certificate criteria, so that all of the vehicles on the road have certain bare minimum safety criteria. It’s for the benefit of all of us to know that the cars on our roads are safe and free of defects.

As you can imagine for such a critically important test, there’s many places across Australia where you can take a roadworthy inspection to get a roadworthy certificate. In QLD, these certificates are known as “Safety Certificates” and they can only be issued by approved inspection stations (AIS), which may include service stations, garages or workshops approved by the Department of Transport and Main Roads; there’s also mobile roadworthy inspection stations which will come to you, and some AIS will provide you with online roadworthy certification; fees for a roadworthy certificate can vary.

What if your vehicle fails the roadworthy inspection? Well, you’ll get a detailed record explaining why you haven’t passed; it’s important at this point to make the compulsory changes required for your vehicle to be considered roadworthy. These rules are important for keeping the driver of the vehicle safe, as well as the other cars on the road, so if circumstances apply where you need a roadworthy certificate (and even if they don’t, for your own peace of mind), find yourself an authorised roadworthy certificate inspection station ASAP to have the vehicle tested.