New Year Quiz time courtesy of Dog & Lemon Guide – a great information source about all things automotive! 

CarJam wish you a Happy New Year with a $1,000 prize in the form of MTA gift vouchers for the lucky winner!

All you need to do to enter is:

• be a registered CarJam user
• “Like” CarJam on Facebook
• submit the correct answers to the questions below

MTA Vouchers can be used for fuel, services and store items at more than 4000 locations nationwide.

The quiz closes on the 31st March 2012 and the winner will be selected and announced on Facebook on April 1st 2012 – so they won’t be an April fool

Please read the terms and conditions of entry below the quiz.

Register for free here if you’re not already a Carjam registered user!

Cheers and Happy New Year!
- Team CarJam

By clicking Submit you confirm you have read and understand the following Terms and Conditions of this Quiz:

Terms and Conditions of the CarGym Workout Quiz

1. Competition entries must be submitted using your registered Carjam user email address and your Facebook name.
2. A single prize of $1,000 worth of MTA Vouchers, not exchangeable for any cash equivalent or other prize, will be awarded to a randomly selected submission which Carjam deem to qualify for the prize according to these terms and conditions.
3. The competition is not open to employees of “CarJam Online” or “Dog and Lemon”.
4. The winner must be a registered Carjam user and their personal Facebook user page must “like” Carjam’s Facebook page to qualify for the prize.
5. All 10 questions must be answered correctly and Carjam’s decision on the correctness of the answers is final and absolute.
6. The competition closes on the 31st March 2012 and the winning submission will be selected on the 1st April 2012.
7. Only one submission per registered CarJam user is permissible – multiple submissions will be disqualified.

No? OK – go on then check the answers!

How many did you guess …?

Tell us about the famous Kiwi motors you find through CarJam and we’ll post them to this list – bound to be lots more!

Although there have been many changes that appeared to have erased that possibility, we have introduced some new features that will see an eventual return to free reports whenever we can do that, which are explained at the end of this email. Please read the following information carefully as all of these changes affect you, our valued customers.

Over the past five months the NZTA have introduced many new changes to the way in which Carjam can provide vehicle data. These changes have at times produced confusion and disruption to our Users, and we have decided to write this release to clarify exactly how these changes affect what you receive in your reports.

On January 1st 2011, the NZTA imposed a “User Pays” system to access vehicle data from the Motor Vehicle Register (MVR). This ‘public’ register is paid for through licensing, WOF and other vehicle fees. As you are aware this created significant outrage and together with our Users we created a petition which gathered more than 25,000 signatures and more than 5,000 personal emails to Minister Stephen Joyce. Although our voices were – quite incredibly – not heard, your support was overwhelming and humbling.

The result of these changes meant that Basic Facts data incurred a fee. To offset this, we decided that we would give our Users 3 free reports per month, for which we would absorb the cost as a sign of good faith and appreciation for all your support. We also introduced business accounts at a considerably reduced rate to ease the burden on our frequent users who were now faced with extra running costs for their businesses and were reliant on that information to survive.

On May 1st 2011, the NZTA introduced a new law, an amendment to the Land Transport Act, which would ‘significantly restrict access’ to ownership information. This new law means that full ownership information can only be given for the following purposes:

• enforcement of the law
• maintenance of the security of New Zealand
• collection of charges imposed or authorised by an enactment; and
• the administration and development of transport law and policy.

If you are registered under the Motor Vehicle Trade Register (MVTR) or the Financial Services Provider Register (FSPR), you can apply through us to have access to that information under terms and conditions set by the NZTA. You can now also find these in our Terms & Conditions.

What does this mean for the casual public user?

Under this new law, the public no longer has access to personal information. You can however use Carjam to “Confirm Ownership”. To do this, click on the link shown on our home page and you will be asked to enter: a) an owner’s surname, and b) their first name or date of birth, and you will receive confirmation of whether the ownership identity is correct. Company details will remain available.

On May 1st 2011, the NZTA also introduced additional fees for ”Outstanding Road User Charges and History (RUC)”, which has always been included in the Basic Facts reports.

All these changes forced us to rethink our pricing many times this year – as a result the following table outlines all the prices for report components from Carjam as of today:

This means our Registered Users will now be getting a comprehensive vehicle report for $9.97 – less than $10.00!

Despite having to charge for things that we don’t want to, our goal remains to provide the public with as much free vehicle data as we can.

Therefore, we have introduced some changes of our own!

Over many months, we have been ‘storing’ all the data from the reports our Users have queried. From now on, when you enter a number plate into our system, it will search this database, and if we have it – we will give it to you for free.

Many of our Users want static information – things that do not change over time, such as VIN and chassis numbers. These free reports will fulfil that function where we can provide them.

However, as this data is stored at the time it is queried, some ‘non-static’ data (such as license and WOF expiries) may be out of date. Please check the timestamp at the top of the report carefully to see how old it is. If you need an updated report, you can still purchase this or use a free lookup by clicking on ‘update’ in the report.

Our ‘Stolen Check’ information is automatically updated in both free and paid reports. There is no additional charge for this information.

Changes to our site: www.carjam.co.nz

You will have noticed changes to the way our site looks and operates. We understand that the integration of these new NZTA changes has at times produced frustration and we apologise for any inconvenience this has caused.

However we have taken your comments on board, and have now created what we hope is a more user friendly tool to access vehicle data.

Your feedback is important to us, so please continue to let us know how we can improve and serve you better.

Kind regards,

The Team at Carjam

Carjam spokesman Paul Osborne says: “Many cars are sold each day. Some of these vehicles are stolen, have dodgy warrants or have had their odometers wound back. Right now, at no charge, consumers can check if a vehicle is safe and legal on our website. Consumers will be denied this information if proposed government charges go ahead.”

Like many other websites, Carjam currently gets basic information for free from the New Zealand Transport Agency’s computers, and then passes this information at no charge to consumers. The NZTA is intending to end this supply of free data, which is widely used in the motor trade to check basic facts about a vehicle.

NZTA proposes to charge websites like Carjam every time it accesses the NZTA computer. Although the charges appear small (16 cents per transaction), due to the huge number of transactions involved (1.5 million reports per month through Carjam), these charges will earn NZTA millions of dollars every year.

“At these rates, we would have to charge to the consumer for each report that we currently provide for free. Also, many consumers still don’t have credit cards; therefore they would have trouble paying for an online report, regardless of how much it cost.”

“The information that the government proposes to charge for belongs to the New Zealand people, not the government. The New Zealand motorist already pays for this data through their motor registration fees. Now the government wants to charge twice.”

“Not only do the registration fees already pay for the information that is stored about their cars, but commercial users of other vehicle information already cover the costs of providing free information to websites like ours.”

Carjam has started an online petition calling for a halt to the proposed charges. This petition has gathered 7000 signatures in just 2 days.

“In the last twelve months our free reports have identified thousands of cases of vehicles with dodgy odometers, plus countless cases of vehicles with no warrant or rego and multiple cases of stolen vehicles being offered for sale to unsuspecting consumers. That’s a huge number of consumers who were protected thanks to our free reports.

Next year, thousands of consumers may end up buying illegal or unsafe cars, thanks to the government’s proposal. It’s not exaggerating to say that lives could be lost as a result,”

Thousands of consumers are likely to end up buying illegal or unsafe
vehicles due to a government proposal to charge for basic vehicle
information, according to the motoring website carjam.co.nz.

Carjam spokesman Paul Osborne says:

 “Many cars are sold each day. Some of these vehicles are stolen, have
dodgy warrants or have had their odometers wound back. Right now, at no
charge, consumers can check if a vehicle is safe and legal on our
website.  Consumers will be denied this information if proposed
government charges go ahead.”

Like many other websites, Carjam currently gets basic information for
free from the New Zealand Transport Agency’s computers, and then passes
this information at no charge to consumers. The NZTA is intending to end
this supply of free data, which is widely used in the motor trade to
check basic facts about a vehicle.

NZTA proposes to charge websites like Carjam every time it accesses the
NZTA computer.  Although the charges appear small (16 cents per
transaction), due to the huge number of transactions involved (1.5
million reports per month through Carjam), these charges will earn NZTA
millions of dollars every year.

“At these rates, we would have to charge to the consumer for each report
that we currently provide for free. Also, many consumers still don't
have credit cards; therefore they would have trouble paying for an
online report, regardless of how much it cost."

“The information that the government proposes to charge for belongs to
the New Zealand people, not the government. The New Zealand motorist
already pays for this data through their motor registration fees. Now
the government wants to charge twice.”

“Not only do the registration fees already pay for the information that
is stored about their cars, but commercial users of other vehicle
information already cover the costs of providing free information to
websites like ours.”

Carjam has started an online petition calling for a halt to the proposed
charges. This petition has gathered 7000 signatures in just 2 days.

“In the last twelve months our free reports have identified thousands of
cases of vehicles with dodgy odometers, plus countless cases of vehicles
with no warrant or rego and multiple cases of stolen vehicles being
offered for sale to unsuspecting consumers. That’s a huge number of
consumers who were protected thanks to our free reports.

Next year, thousands of consumers may end up buying illegal or unsafe
cars, thanks to the government’s proposal. It’s not exaggerating to say
Thousands of consumers are likely to end up buying illegal or unsafe
vehicles due to a government proposal to charge for basic vehicle
information, according to the motoring website carjam.co.nz.

Carjam spokesman Paul Osborne says:

 “Many cars are sold each day. Some of these vehicles are stolen, have
dodgy warrants or have had their odometers wound back. Right now, at no
charge, consumers can check if a vehicle is safe and legal on our
website.  Consumers will be denied this information if proposed
government charges go ahead.”

Like many other websites, Carjam currently gets basic information for
free from the New Zealand Transport Agency’s computers, and then passes
this information at no charge to consumers. The NZTA is intending to end
this supply of free data, which is widely used in the motor trade to
check basic facts about a vehicle.

NZTA proposes to charge websites like Carjam every time it accesses the
NZTA computer.  Although the charges appear small (16 cents per
transaction), due to the huge number of transactions involved (1.5
million reports per month through Carjam), these charges will earn NZTA
millions of dollars every year.

“At these rates, we would have to charge to the consumer for each report
that we currently provide for free. Also, many consumers still don't
have credit cards; therefore they would have trouble paying for an
online report, regardless of how much it cost."

“The information that the government proposes to charge for belongs to
the New Zealand people, not the government. The New Zealand motorist
already pays for this data through their motor registration fees. Now
the government wants to charge twice.”

“Not only do the registration fees already pay for the information that
is stored about their cars, but commercial users of other vehicle
information already cover the costs of providing free information to
websites like ours.”

Carjam has started an online petition calling for a halt to the proposed
charges. This petition has gathered 7000 signatures in just 2 days.

“In the last twelve months our free reports have identified thousands of
cases of vehicles with dodgy odometers, plus countless cases of vehicles
with no warrant or rego and multiple cases of stolen vehicles being
offered for sale to unsuspecting consumers. That’s a huge number of
consumers who were protected thanks to our free reports.

Next year, thousands of consumers may end up buying illegal or unsafe
cars, thanks to the government’s proposal. It’s not exaggerating to say
that lives could be lost as a result,”
that lives could be lost as a result,”

Breakfast team gets the lowdown on buying a used car from our consumer commentator Troy Churton.

Watch the Episode TVNZ Breakfast: Tips for buying a used car.

CarJam got a plug too!

What secrets is the bloke selling your car not telling you? CarJam got a plug too!

Watch the Episode: “FairGo: The secret life of cars”

The advice is: never buy a vehicle without a vehicle report. And you all know CarJam is the best and cheapest!

• Using CarJam it is not possible to find an exact address unlike using NZPost which provides the full name and street address. We only provide name and suburb which a seller should know in order to prove they are the owner
• The CarJam price ($9 or $7.4 for registered users) gets you much more information that just ownership history you get at NZPost of course!

Continue to read “Trade Me car thieves growing net savvy“ article at New Zealand Herald.

Thanks to seeing the article, I dug deeper and found out that the car had been in an accident and had been written off.  The dealer, posing as a private vendor, continued to lie to me when I asked him if the car had been in an accident.  When I asked if I could arrange for an AA inspection he offered to organise an “inspection” through another company for me… just like the guy featured in the article.  Buying the vehicle report from your website was the best $14 I ever spent!!