DVSA Freezes Car MOT Fees as Lorry and Bus Tests Rise 11 Percent

DVSA has raised the maximum service charge testing centres can levy on HGVs, buses, coaches and trailers by up to 11 percent from 6 July 2026, the first change to that cap in sixteen years.
The statutory MOT fee for ordinary cars and motorcycles has not moved and stays at £54.85 and £29.65, even as garages warn the freeze is squeezing the network that tests family cars.
DVSA’s own consultation drew 634 responses, with 99 percent of testing centres backing higher charges, against just 62 percent support among operators who only run vehicles rather than test them.

Lorry and Bus Testing Just Got Dearer, but Your Car’s MOT Fee Has Not Moved

From 6 July 2026, the maximum service charge that Authorised Testing Facilities can add on top of the statutory DVSA test fee for HGVs, buses, coaches and trailers went up for the first time in sixteen years. The change followed a DVSA consultation that ran from 25 September to 21 November 2025 and drew 634 responses, after which the agency confirmed it would proceed with the increases exactly as proposed, without amendment.

The new maximum service charges are £70 for an HGV, up from £55, £50 for a trailer, up from £40, and £90 for a bus or coach, up from £70. DVSA estimates the overall increase in the total cost of a test, including its own statutory fee on top of the service charge, works out at 9 percent for HGVs and 11 percent for both trailers and buses and coaches.

Nothing has changed for the millions of drivers who take an ordinary car or motorcycle in for its annual MOT. The statutory fee cap for a car test remains £54.85, and for a motorcycle £29.65, exactly where it has sat for years, with no rise announced alongside the heavy vehicle changes.

Who This Hits

An Authorised Testing Facility, often shortened to ATF, is simply a garage or depot approved by DVSA to carry out the official test on heavier vehicles, in the same way an ordinary garage is approved to test cars. The service charge is what that ATF charges for its own time, equipment and premises, separate from the DVSA statutory fee that funds the test itself, which is why two separate figures, a service charge and a statutory fee, sit on top of each other on every invoice.

The immediate cost falls on operators of HGVs, buses, coaches and trailers, and on the testing centres themselves, who had been asking for the increase to reflect what they say are much higher running costs than when the service charge cap was last set in 2010. DVSA’s consultation results show a clear divide in how welcome that increase was: 99 percent of respondents who run Authorised Testing Facilities backed raising the cap, but that support dropped to 62 percent among respondents who operate vehicles but do not also run a testing centre, the group actually paying the higher charge.

For ordinary drivers, the direct hit is smaller, but not nothing. Bus and coach operators facing an 11 percent rise in their testing costs, and hauliers facing a 9 percent rise on HGVs, do not typically absorb that cost indefinitely. It tends to filter through into fares and into the delivery and freight charges built into the price of goods carried by road, which is most of what arrives in UK shops.

There is also a second, quieter group affected: everyday car owners, not through a fee rise, but through what garages say the lack of one is doing to the testing network they rely on.

The Numbers Behind the Freeze

The Independent Garage Association has been pushing for an increase to the £54.85 car MOT fee for some time, warning that costs for testing equipment, staff and premises have risen well beyond what that fee has kept pace with. DVSA’s position, confirmed alongside the heavy vehicle changes, is that there are no current plans to raise the car and motorcycle fee.

That leaves a widening gap between what a testing centre can charge to test a seven and a half tonne lorry, now up to £70 in service charges alone before the DVSA fee is added, and what the same testing centre can charge to test a family hatchback, capped at £54.85 in total including the statutory fee. Garages that run mixed test bays for cars and heavier vehicles now have a much clearer financial incentive to prioritise the vehicle types where the fee has actually moved.

Sixteen years is the length of time the HGV, bus and trailer service charge cap had gone without any change before this consultation, according to DVSA’s own figures. The DVSA statutory fee for cars has itself only had modest adjustments over a comparable stretch, which is the underlying complaint from the garage trade bodies pushing for a rise.

The consultation itself ran for eight weeks, closing on 21 November 2025, and gathered views from testing centres, hauliers, bus and coach operators and trade bodies before DVSA published its decision to proceed. That is a relatively short window for a change affecting a fee structure that had been untouched for sixteen years, and it explains why some operator groups feel the increase arrived quickly once it was finally confirmed.

What It Costs and What It Means

If you run a minibus, coach, HGV or trailer over the relevant tonnage threshold, budget for a real increase from 6 July 2026 onward: up to 9 percent more for an HGV test and up to 11 percent more for a trailer, bus or coach test, on top of whatever the testing centre already charged you before the change.

If you only drive a car or motorcycle, your statutory MOT fee has not moved, and there is no new charge to plan for this year on that front. The consequence for you is indirect and slower moving: independent garages have been warning that a frozen car test fee against rising costs makes MOT testing a less attractive part of a garage’s business, which in the long run can mean fewer testing slots, longer waits, or testing centres deciding to stop offering car MOTs altogether in favour of more profitable work.

None of that has happened as a direct outcome of this specific consultation, which covered heavy vehicles only. But the gap between a cap that just rose for the first time in sixteen years for lorries and buses, and a car fee that has not moved even after years of the same lobbying, is exactly what trade bodies point to when warning about testing capacity for ordinary drivers.

Passengers on bus and coach routes are a further step removed from the change but are still likely to feel it eventually. Operators facing higher testing bills alongside other rising costs, such as fuel and driver wages, have limited places to recover that money other than through fares, so a rise in ticket prices on some routes over the coming year would not be a surprising knock-on effect of a fee change that, on its face, has nothing to do with passengers at all.

What to Do Next

Operators of HGVs, buses, coaches or trailers should check with their usual testing centre for the new charge before booking a test from 6 July 2026 onward, as testing centres are free to set their own charge up to the new higher maximum rather than being required to charge the maximum itself.

Car and motorcycle owners do not need to do anything differently for now, as the £54.85 and £29.65 statutory fee caps remain unchanged. It is still worth booking an MOT test in good time before it is due, given ongoing warnings from garage trade bodies about pressure on testing capacity, rather than leaving it to the last available slot in your area. Drivers unsure what a borderline result actually requires of them can also read what actually happens if you ignore an MOT advisory, a separate decision from the fee itself.

Anyone running a fleet that mixes car-sized vehicles with heavier ones, such as a business with both company cars and a van or minibus over the tonnage threshold, should check which category each vehicle now falls into, as the two fee structures have just moved further apart than they have been in over a decade.

Sources:
GOV.UK, Changes to HGV, bus and trailer MOT centre service charges (consultation outcome): gov.uk
GOV.UK, MOT testing service, statutory fees: gov.uk