GroupNexus Moto Burton in Kendal

[b789]

@Foxy01 a sole trader business is not a separate legal person from the individual. So if a vehicle is registered to “John Smith t/a John Smith Plumbing”, the registered keeper is still John Smith in law. The trading style does not create a separate legal entity. Because of that, you cannot run an argument that the Keeper could not have been the driver simply because the vehicle is registered in a sole trader style. That point would go nowhere.

However, that does not assist the operator either. The fact that the vehicle is registered to you as a sole trader does not prove that you were the driver on the material date. Vehicle registration is not evidence of driver identity. Plenty of people are insured to drive other vehicles with the owner’s permission, including under third party cover. So the operator cannot simply point to the V5C details and pretend that this proves who was driving.

The Keeper is under no legal obligation to identify the driver. If the operator wants to say that the Keeper was the driver, the burden is on them to prove it. Unless the Keeper identifies themself as the driver, the operator will generally have no proper way of doing so.

That is why PoFA matters. If they cannot prove who the driver was, their only route to pursuing the Keeper is full compliance with Schedule 4 of PoFA. They have not achieved that here. So the important point is not whether the Keeper could theoretically have been the driver. The important point is that the operator has not shown who the driver was and cannot transfer liability to the Keeper because the Notice to Keeper is not PoFA compliant.