Terms of use
Last updated 17 July 2026.
These terms govern your use of CarKept (https://www.carkept.co.uk). By using the site — looking up a vehicle, creating an account, claiming a car, adding a record, or buying a report — you agree to them. If you don’t agree, please don’t use the service. See also our privacy policy, which explains how we handle personal data and forms part of these terms.
Who we are
CarKept is an independent UK service. CarKept is an independent service and is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or operated by the DVSA, DVLA, or any government body. We publish public MOT test data under the Open Government Licence v3.0 and let vehicle owners build their own verified maintenance record on top of it.
The free service
Anyone can look up a UK vehicle’s registration for free and see its MOT test history and any maintenance records its owner has chosen to make public. This part of the service never requires an account. MOT data comes from the DVSA and is provided “as is” — we don’t control it, verify it beyond what the DVSA itself publishes, or guarantee it’s free of errors. Always check important details (test dates, mileage, advisories) against the vehicle itself or an official source before relying on them for a purchase decision.
Accounts and claiming a vehicle
Creating an account (handled by our authentication provider, Clerk) lets you claim a vehicle you own or possess, and add maintenance records to it. You’re responsible for keeping your account credentials secure and for anything done through your account. Claiming a vehicle requires evidence (your V5C logbook, or a photo of the car and its plate with a one-time code) — providing false or misleading evidence to claim a vehicle you don’t own or possess is a breach of these terms and may be reported.
Records you add
When you add a maintenance record, you confirm that the information and any document you upload (an invoice or receipt) genuinely relates to that vehicle and is accurate to the best of your knowledge. You keep ownership of anything you upload; by uploading it, you give us the licence we need to store it, display the record according to its verification tier, and (where you use the paid Open Report feature) make it visible to buyers you’ve chosen to share it with. We may decline to publish, or may flag for review, a record that appears to relate to a different vehicle, appears duplicated, or otherwise looks unreliable — this protects the integrity of every vehicle’s record, including yours.
Every record carries one of three verification tiers, and we use this wording precisely: owner reported (self-declared, no supporting document), invoice attached (backed by an uploaded document), or garage confirmed(the garage itself has confirmed the work). We never describe a record as “certified” or “guaranteed” — a tier is a statement of how a record was verified, not a warranty of the underlying work.
What a job cost is never shown to anyone but the person who uploaded it — not to other viewers of the vehicle, not in a Kept Report, not to a buyer. This applies regardless of any other setting or feature.
Kept Reports and payment
A Kept Report is a shareable page combining a vehicle’s MOT history and maintenance records. A free version is always available; the Full Kept Report (£8.99) unlocks additional detail for that specific vehicle, paid via Stripe. No account is required to buy one — access is granted to the email address used at checkout. Because a Full Kept Report is digital content delivered immediately on payment, by unlocking it you agree to immediate access and acknowledge that you lose the standard 14-day right to cancel that would otherwise apply under the Consumer Contracts Regulations 2013. If something goes wrong with a purchase — you were charged but never got access, for example — contact hello@carkept.co.ukand we’ll put it right.
A vehicle’s owner can separately pay (£9.99) to make their own vehicle’s full report publicly viewable, without a purchase, for a fixed window (60days) — useful when selling. This is the owner’s own choice to publish their vehicle’s record; it never changes who can see what a job cost, which stays uploader-only regardless.
Free reminder emails
The MOT and service reminder tools are free and optional. Subscribing requires confirming via a link we email you (double opt-in) — we never send a reminder to an address that hasn’t confirmed it. You can unsubscribe at any time with one click from the link in any reminder email, with no login required; doing so deletes the subscription. We send only the reminder(s) you asked for — no other marketing.
Acceptable use
You agree not to:
- Scrape, bulk-download, or systematically extract data from the site;
- Resell, redistribute, or republish DVSA data or any part of the site’s content as your own dataset or product;
- Claim a vehicle you don’t own or possess, or submit false evidence to do so;
- Add a record you know to be false, or upload a document that doesn’t genuinely belong to the vehicle;
- Attempt to circumvent the free-lookup rate limit or any other technical protection on the site;
- Use the service in any way that implies affiliation with, or endorsement by, the DVSA, DVLA, or any government body; or
- Use the service for any unlawful purpose, or in a way that could damage, disable, or impair it for others.
We may suspend or terminate access for anyone who breaches these terms.
Intellectual property
The CarKeptname, branding, and site design are ours. MOT data remains subject to the DVSA’s Open Government Licence terms. Content you upload (records, documents, photos) remains yours, subject to the licence you grant us above to store and display it according to these terms.
Disclaimers
The service is provided “as is”. We don’t guarantee that MOT data is complete, current, or error-free (it’s only as good as the DVSA’s own source data), that the service will be uninterrupted or fault-free, or that any particular maintenance record, however verified, is a complete account of a vehicle’s history. A garage-confirmed record means the named garage confirmed that specific piece of work — it is not a guarantee about the vehicle’s overall condition. Always combine what you see here with your own inspection and, where appropriate, an independent mechanical check before buying a car.
Limitation of liability
Nothing in these terms limits our liability for death or personal injury caused by our negligence, for fraud, or for anything else that can’t lawfully be limited or excluded under English law. Subject to that, we’re not liable for indirect or consequential losses arising from your use of the service, and our total liability for any claim relating to a paid report is limited to the amount you paid for it.
Changes to the service and these terms
We may change or discontinue parts of the service, and may update these terms from time to time — we’ll update the “last updated” date above when we do. Continuing to use the service after a change means you accept the updated terms.
Governing law
These terms are governed by the law of England and Wales, and any dispute is subject to the exclusive jurisdiction of the courts of England and Wales.
Contact us
Questions about these terms: hello@carkept.co.uk.
See also our privacy policy and data methodology.