Minibus 2004

Another old page on Minibus Laws.

Disclaimer and health warning!

Whatever you do, don't act upon the information on this page. This is information we've collated that be believe is correct, but we're not offering any guarantees. Use at your own risk! As we've hit (more) problems recently (April 2004) regarding regulations for who can tow what in a minibus, with and without a trailer, we'll use this page to try and bring together what we know. The same issue came up in 2000 - please see this page for a summary. If you think we've got something wrong, please let us know.

Oh! MAMmy...

Ok, let's start with some terminology. All vehicles has a Maximim Authorised Mass (MAM), as do trailers. This is the maximum combined weight of the vehicle mass and the load it's carrying.

The regulations all relate to MAM - it's irrelevant whether the minibus/trailer/whatever isn't actually carrying the full MAM, it's the rated MAM of the vehicle that counts.

As discussed at the AGM, we reckon our trailer has a MAM of 1200-1400kg. No we don't know for sure, but agree this is a good estimate - anyway, it's way above the magical 750kg threshold (see below).

What are your licence entitlements?

With a B entitlement (i.e. post-1997 licences)

• You can drive a <=8 seater with a MAM up to 3500kg.

• You can tow a "light trailer" behind an <=8 seater

  • if the trailer has a MAM of <=750kg you can take a combined MAM of up to 4250kg (i.e. 3500 + 750)
  • if the trailer has a MAM of >750kg you can take a combined MAM of 3500kg

The Students' Union have mentioned subsidising some of our drivers (2 a year) to take an additional driving test which would add an E entitlement to the licence (B+E), which would mean

• You can combine a vehicle up to 3500kg MAM with trailers >750kg MAM

A few, older (pre-1997 license) drivers have D1+E, which allows towing behind <17 seater, including trailers >750kg MAM.

What does this mean for the club?

• Our trailer has a MAM >750kg
• Having consulted DVLA and garages, it seems highly unlikely we could get our trailer re-rated to <750kg
• If you take the estimated MAM of our trailer (1200-1400kg) from the B entitlement (3500kg), you don't have enough allowance for the MAM of the bus (even the towing bus)
• Therefore, no recent (post-1997 licensed) drivers can tow our trailer behind anyting. Not minibuses, nor the 7-seater union towing bus
• Taking the extra test to gain B+E would allow drivers to tow our trailer, but only behind a <=8 seater (i.e. the union towing bus, or an MPV, or something
• There's the possibility of getting a <750kg trailer made up, but it wouldn't carry many boats (8, at a guess), and you'd still only be able to tow it behind a <=8 seater
• Out of all the trips we've run this year (2003-2004) we've only managed to get the union towing bus for: Woolacombe, Student Rodeo, Scotland. How would all the other trips run?

In addition (oh yes, it gets worse), the union have noticed that by piling kit on a minibus roofrack we're likely to be pushing the 3500kg MAM limit (presuming the minibus is rated that high in the first place), and if not that then we'll at least be overloading the manufacturers limit for the roof/roofrack (150kg) which will invalidate the insurance. So they've said we can't put more than 6 boats on the roofrack. Fair enough, I think all the drivers are much happier about not pusing the limit.

References

• DVLA page on towing trailers
• Ignore the Union minibus web pages, they've now admitted they're incorrect.