Control Technique

General Discussion
1

Hi everyone,

Does anyone know where I might be able to get our car through the Control Technique without changing the headlamps?? I was just wondering if there was a garage someone might have been to with their English car.

Many many thanks in advance.

Gill Kingxxxx

2

Gill,

You have to get them changed… No way out of it i’m afraid.
We’ve just imported our car from the UK to France… it’s a VW Golf 2007… we found one light second hand on ebay in germany, but in the end went for 2 new ones that our local garage here in revel (31) ordered. VW wanted e700 plus fitting. the garage did it for e450 all in. (after we got the part no’s from VW) The CT was e70… you must however have the certificate of conformity from the manufacturer - we got ours for £10 from VW - you just fill in an online form, plus of course the usual mountain of paperwork. It cost us e278 for the import fees (but would have been more, as it’s a points system based on power i think - ours is an 8, but the CT garage put it down as a 7 and that’s written into law now!)

then we had the 2 plates made - e30 - and the husband fitted them.

All in all a palaver, BUT not hard if you do it in the right order, and remember to take ALL the paperwork with you every step.

The best thing of course is that that’s it! NO ROAD TAX, and just the CT every two years…



Teresa


La Maison Verdigris Luxury B&B near Carcassonne
3

yes the chance of us getting a spare set were pretty slim too! All depends on the car’s popularity in France and age I guess. I was so relieved when we found the little switch that allowed us to convert them ourselves I can tell you!

4

Thanks Peter that was the one I was trying to remember!

5

All very well if you have a 10 yr old laguna or the like, but I couldn’t find any scrapped cars of the same model within a 100 km radius. Even on Ebay there was only one pair…

6

Gill
I think the cost of a CAT is €65 or thereabouts - if all OK and the car passes first time.
P

7

Hi Peter,
That’s great info!!!
Just out of curiosity can you remember how much it costs??
Cheers
Gill

8

Hi Gill
On the Narbonne road out of Carcassonne, opposite the Etap hotel is a small CAT garage called AAB (244 Av Gen Leclerc). They passed my car with just the deflectors on the headlamps. Can’t guarantee it but worth a try.
Peter

9

Thanks everyone for your top advice!! I’ll look into all that. We have a Citroen C5 so might be in luck with the local casse.
Cheers
Gill

10

I know - I couldn’t believe it at the time. Funnily enough when we took the car back in for service & pointed out the little switch the garage were a little taken aback… they should have known their cars had that function built in.

Gill I hope you have a french car otherwise it might be expensive to change them!

11

you must be joking ! just go along to your local casse-auto to avoid paying a fortune :wink:

12

I did hear about a place in Carcassonne after changing mine, but not sure of the name. The other potential hazard is that if you were involved in something and it came out that you had UK lamps, it may invalidate any insurance. That would be bad…

13

Hi Gill - try the garage in Pezenas opposite Carrefour & McDo - the chap there used to be our neighbour, he said as long as we had the right paperwork he’d pass it with stickers on. Sorry can’t remember the garage name something like Auto Controle Technique on Av de Verdun.

Might sound daft, but have u definitely not got switches? Our car has (even though the BMW garage in Beziers told us we needed new headlamps at 1700 euro!). My husband found out on the web & we now can switch them from euro to UK setting with a little spanner.