48: Do you provide vehicles for other special events, apart from weddings?

The main business we provide vehicles for are Weddings, Wedding/Marriage Blessings and Civil Partnership Ceremonies.  We also provide our cars to Film and Television production companies for filming, Funeral Hire and also for paid promotional events where the carriage of passengers is not required.   Regretfully we do not usually provide vehicles for any other special occasion due to ‘Wedding Hire’ insurance restrictions.

If you require a car for another type of event we need to ensure vehicles available for this have the appropriate ‘Private Hire’ insurance and licences as required by UK law.  Although a vehicle owners insurance company may cover their car for other special events, UK law does not permit any vehicle to be used for other events such as Anniversaries, Birthdays, Hen & Stag Nights, School Proms, Day Trips etc. unless the vehicle owner has been granted a licence by the local council to carry out these other types of events, and also the vehicle in question has been licenced.  If a vehicle owner carries out an event that is not a wedding with a vehicle that has not been licensed by the local council it can be impounded, crushed and the owner heavily fined as has happened to unsuspecting owners from other companies in the past.  The annual cost of these licences are very expensive and coupled with twice annually strict MOT’s for the vehicle’s the cost to gain a licence is not usually practical for most owners with Classic or Vintage cars as these other types of event are a very small proportion of their work and the outlay may never be recouped.  Thankfully the government understands certain traditions are a part of our heritage and therefore does not impose these stricter requirements on vehicles used only for Weddings and Funerals.

Regretfully we are unable to become involved in arranging anything ourselves other than for Funeral or Wedding related hires as detailed above.   Thank you for your understanding.