Cavan motorists driving over €11m worth of ‘Zombie’ cars

Close to 40,000 ex-salvage and insurance write off’s have been imported from UK

After completing it's first major cross border analysis of salvaged and written off vehicles imported into Ireland from the UK, a car history check company estimates over €11 million worth of so called 'Zombie' cars are currently being driven on Cavan Roads.

MotorCheck.ie found that close to 40,000 ex-salvage and insurance write off’s have been imported from UK following their massive cross border analysis, but experts believe the true figure may be much more.

“The company found over 39,336 affected vehicles that had been imported into the Republic of Ireland. At today’s values, the market value of those affected is €11,381,045in Cavan alone and €318 Million across the Republic of Ireland. Examples of Zombie cars were found currently for sale privately and on dealers’ forecourts with ‘All Clear’ histories,” say Motorcheck.ie in a statement issued today.

The research conducted by Motorcheck, as seen on last night’s RTÉ Primetime, represents a potentially serious safety concern and financial liability.

Despite the introduction of new Brexit linked import charges, the number of vehicles imported from the UK to the Republic of Ireland remains high.

In 2021 over 83,000 vehicles have been imported with a total of 457,000 coming across the water over the past four years.

In an effort to understand the prevalence of Zombie vehicles (those brought back to life but not correctly identified as insurance write offs or ex-salvage) amongst those being imported.