A 73 Auto report mixes five kinds of data: live official UK vehicle records, fixed official tax/charge rates, published official and industry statistics, information you provide, and 73 Auto’s own cost estimates. This page lists exactly which is which, honestly, including which parts are NOT live integrations.
Last reviewedEvery figure in a report comes from one of these, and we label it so you always know what is official and what is our estimate.
Looked up live by registration number at the moment you run a check. Results are cached for around 24 hours per registration so a repeat lookup of the same car doesn’t re-query DVLA unnecessarily.
Looked up live by registration number, and also cached for around 24 hours per registration.
The published UK VED rate bands are manually entered into 73 Auto as fixed values and applied against the vehicle’s CO2 figure and first-registration date from DVLA. These are official government rates, but 73 Auto is not a live government API integration. The bands are code, not a live feed, so when HMRC/DVLA change them there is a lag until 73 Auto is updated and redeployed with the new figures. For an exact, time-sensitive VED amount, verify directly with DVLA.
Transport for London’s published daily Congestion Charge and Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) rates are manually entered into 73 Auto as fixed values, applied when a vehicle isn’t charge-compliant and is estimated to be driven in the relevant zone. This is not a live TfL API integration and not a commercial partnership with TfL. It is a manually maintained reference to TfL’s published rates, so a rate change by TfL only takes effect here once 73 Auto is updated and redeployed. For an exact, time-sensitive charge amount, verify directly with TfL.
The UK average pump prices for unleaded petrol and diesel, from the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero’s weekly road fuel price statistics on GOV.UK. 73 Auto loads the latest published week automatically and every fuel calculation records which week’s price it used; your own price per litre, if you enter one, is used instead.
Published datasets used to calibrate 73 Auto’s models, refreshed on a schedule rather than looked up per car:
No insurer quote engine or price comparison site is used.
| Dataset | Source | Coverage | Licence |
|---|---|---|---|
| MOT tests and results | DVSA anonymised data | 2023–2024, about 65.5 million class 4 tests | Open Government Licence |
| Vehicle licensing | DfT / DVLA (VEH0120, VEH0124, VEH0160, VEH0105, VEH0142) | Plug-in cars by local authority | Open Government Licence |
| Car fuel and CO2 | Vehicle Certification Agency | 2001–2016; WLTP snapshots 2020 to today | Crown copyright, OGL re-use |
| Vehicle tax rates | GOV.UK (V149) | Current published rates | Open Government Licence |
| Police recorded crime | Home Office; DfT licensed-car counts | By area | Open Government Licence |
Rankings, adjusted ratios (observed ÷ expected for cars of the same age, mileage and fuel), survival indications and cost estimates on these pages are 73 Auto analysis and are labelled as such.
Asking prices for comparable cars, used to estimate a car’s current market value for depreciation, and dated fitted-tyre prices, used for tyre costs. Both are collected only from sources whose terms and robots rules permit it, and never by bypassing a block. Car values are based on asking prices, not sold prices.
The side-profile illustration shown next to your registration plate (hatchback, saloon, estate, SUV, MPV, pickup, van and more) is chosen deterministically, never by a live lookup: first from the DVLA type approval and wheelplan for goods vehicles, otherwise from a pre-built local reference table generated from VehiclesDB (vehiclesdb.com, CC BY 4.0), cross-checked against real UK-registered model names from DfT vehicle licensing statistics. When the body type can’t be determined confidently, a neutral vehicle outline is shown rather than a guess — this never affects any cost figure.
Anything you enter yourself narrows the relevant cost estimate and is marked as user-provided in the report, kept separate from modelled and default values:
Depreciation, insurance premium, servicing, repairs and maintenance, tyres, fuel/energy consumption, finance cost and roadside cover are all 73 Auto’s own statistical estimates, not live feeds from insurers, garages, fuel retailers or finance providers. See the full breakdown of how each is built on the Methodology page.
For the full explanation of how each cost category is calculated from this data (depreciation, fuel/energy, insurance, servicing, repairs, tyres, tax and finance), see the Methodology page. To see this data laid out in a full, real report, see an example report, or calculate the cost of your car. Quick question? See the FAQ. Spotted a source that's out of date? See Corrections.
