Gareth Jones is rather proud of his family’s new Hobby 495 De Luxe Easy. Boasting six berths and a U-shaped dinette, it’s bright and modern, and has a reasonable MTPLM of 1350kg. He’s also rather smug about it. Why? Because he bought their new van for £4000 less than the list price printed in the back of this magazine. That’s right. List price for the Hobby: £12,500. Price paid by the Jones family: £9500. Right then, you’ll be wanting to know how you can keep up with the Joneses and bag yourself a similarly impressive bargain. As this report will reveal, the answer involves many more risks than you might imagine, but if you’re prepared to take them, then you could make a similar saving as the Joneses – by personally importing your new caravan from the Continent.
“Last year we were looking at buying a new Bailey Discovery which had been recommended to us by several caravan user groups on the internet,” recalls Gareth. “Unfortunately, neither Bailey itself nor any of the local dealers had a Discovery demonstrator and, we were told, by the time they had one the waiting lists would be full and we would have missed the boat for that year. We’d already sold our current caravan and didn’t want to enter into the next season without a caravan. However, through the internet user groups we had been visiting, such as uk.rec.caravanning (via search engine Google), we heard about people importing new caravans from the Continent – specifically Germany – and saving themselves a packet in the process.”

Currency affairs
What is absolutely key to this saving is the pound/euro exchange rate. When the Jones family were carrying out their research in November 2002, the pound was strong against the euro, and although the euro gained strength as the Joneses continued their search, it became obvious that it was still very easy to save several thousand pounds.
All this may seem like the Jones were particularly intrepid. However, most German dealerships will have at least one fluent English-speaker, and the internet makes life even easier. The web allows you to glean most of the information that you need to choose a caravan or a dealer before you even have to pick up the phone to tackle the nitty-gritty of prices, ordering, collection and exact spec. Google also has a translation facility that will help you pick your way through any especially tricky parts of a website.
“After doing a huge amount of research on the internet we still hadn’t really found a model that suited our needs,” says Jones. “We next decided to check out a site that had been recommended to us by other internet users. We visited www.joeressen.de, the website of PJ Joeressen, a family-run dealership based in Mönchengladbach that’s been going for about 50 years.”
Here at Practical Caravan we decided to give Franz Josef Joeressen a call. Herr Joeressen quoted us E12,442 for a Hobby 495 De Luxe Easy including an awning, which works out to be £8615. The Joneses did even better than that; the exchange rate at the time that they bought their Hobby gave them a sterling price of £7700. But even at the current rate, it seems that there’s still a substantial saving to be made over the £12,500 list price quoted by Hobby’s official UK importers.
However, this is far from the bottom line. In addition to German VAT of 16 percent, there’s a small fee for registering the caravan in Germany. It’s also likely that you will need to pay a charge for the delivery of the caravan from the manufacturer to the dealer, and at £350 this is a significant amount.
Then there’s the matter of getting the caravan back to Britain. How much this costs very much depends on the time of year. Gareth Jones, who ordered his caravan in November 2002 to collect it in February 2003, managed to score himself a ferry ticket for just £82. “Mind you,” he recalls, “I nearly brought Dover to a standstill on the outward journey because the P&O check-in person couldn’t get his head around the fact that I had a ticket for a car and a caravan when the caravan appeared to have fallen off the back.” You must also factor in the cost of fuel, but as Mönchengladbach is less than 200 miles from Calais, you’ll spend only around £50 for the Continental leg of the journey.
As a halfway option, Joeressens can organise shipping to London for E1000 (around £692) which, if you didn’t manage to score a bargain ferry ticket, is barely more than the cost of collecting the caravan yourself. And even after you’ve factored in these extra costs, buying that Hobby abroad still works out considerably cheaper than buying it here.

The pitfalls
Now, it would be easy to understand a small difference in price between the officially imported models and one bought on the Continent; for one thing, at 16 percent the German VAT is slightly less than our own, at 17.5 percent. Then there are the delivery charges, which are likely to be higher via a heavy-goods transporter company, which must also insure the caravan during transit. But for a saving of some £3885, surely there must be a catch?
Unfortunately, there is. In fact, there are lots of catches, and if you have the slightest notion of doing what the Joneses did, this is where you need to pay attention. Buying a caravan abroad can cut thousands from the initial outlay, but you may not find that saving so exciting when you consider the compromises you’ll have to make.
When you buy a caravan in, say, Germany, you’re getting a product built for the German specifically market. There are some practical implications here. For starters, that means the wiring will be fitted according to German specification, and that includes two-pin European sockets instead of our own three-pin ones. We asked two British dealers with NCC-approved workshops how much it would cost to have a German caravan rewired to the British system, but neither of them could quote – it seems the job is too impractical even for consideration. This is because the wiring is an integral part of the caravan, so you would have to more or less dismantle the whole caravan just to get at the wiring. The only alternative is to buy yourself a pack of European-to-British plug adaptors and use these at each mains point.
Roger Crafts, head of Lowdhams Leisureworld in Nottingham is particularly familiar with the business of importing foreign caravans; the firm is the official importer of German Hymer caravans, which it has specially produced over there to comply with UK safety standards. As well as highlighting the practical problem caused by a lack of 13A main sockets, Crafts is concerned about the safety risks posed by German wiring used in the UK: “It’s the trip and the earthing that worries us more than whether the van has a UK-type socket.” This problem can occur because Continental caravans are built to work with a lower voltage of electricity; using appliances with the UK’s higher voltage can therefore cause the electrics to trip out, though in reality this is a rare occurrence.
Crafts also alerts buyers to the lower standards of European gas system standards. “German vans don’t tend to have gas-drop vents to allow leaked gas to escape. They don’t have the low-level and high-level ventilation we have. Over here, any build up of carbon monoxide would disperse because there’s a flow of air. But in Germany they have a different mindset about these things, and the vans are therefore not compliant with gas standards here.”
There are plenty of other things to consider. Michael Hold, former director of the Barrons Group of dealerships, recounted the experiences of a friend who had also imported his own Hobby. It had no 12V charging system to operate the leisure battery, so the friend had to limit himself to sites with hook-up as his electrics would only work off the mains. He also found that Hobby’s use of steel piping for the water system problematic; when there was a fault with it he found it hard to locate a workshop that would help.
“I had never even seen steel water piping until my friend showed me his van,” says Hold. Another practical point to consider is that the door will be on the ‘wrong’ side – on the offside of the caravan instead of the nearside. That’s because whichever country a caravan is made in, the entry door is located on the opposite side of the caravan to the traffic so that it is safe for you to get inside the caravan at a layby, should you need to. It’s also worth bearing in mind that many Continental caravans don’t have an oven. You may be happy to holiday without one, but if you decide to retro-fit one you must remember that this will significantly reduce the payload available for your personal possessions.
Then there are the soft furnishings. British law states that all new caravans sold in the UK must comply with our stringent regulations that require the use of flame-retardant fabrics. Caravans built only to European safety standards are not required to do this.
Of course, as one dealer we spoke to pointed out, in the old days none of the furnishings were fire-retardant. Gareth Jones had thought of this, too.
“I was aware of this as a possible issue,” he says, “but took a pragmatic view that there must be thousands of second-hand caravans on the market without this.” It is, however, possible to have all of your imported caravans’ furnishings – seat covers, curtains, and so on – replaced by a company such as the Caravan and Boat Seat Cover Centre in Bristol. But remember to allow around £1000-£2000.

Setting the standard
Though a foreign van may meet EU standards, the fact remains that it caravan won’t be quite as safe as a similar model bought in the UK, because our safety regulations are tougher. We have the National Caravan Council, whose caravan approval scheme is designed to check whether new British tourers comply with UK safety standards; approval is only given to those van which comply and which also pass the NCC’s own criteria.
We asked the NCC’s former director general Alan Bishop what he would advise anyone thinking of importing their own foreign caravan. “The major problem with buying a caravan from Europe – or indeed anywhere in the world – is that you have no easy means of telling if it complies with UK legislation and health and safety standards. You will not have the peace of mind that the NCC Certification scheme gives. It will be up to the customer, to satisfy themselves that the product you have spent a large amount of money on is safe for use in Britain – for example, does it meet UK electrical and gas installations; is it fitted with the required fire-retardant fabrics and upholstery?”
If the saving still looks as impressive, even with foreign electrical and gas systems, and a lack of UK safety standards, you might want to consider what happens when you get the caravan back to the UK. What do you do if something goes wrong with it? Not only is the caravan’s manufacturer based on the Continent, but so is the dealer from which you bought it, and he’s the only one you can hold to account. Gareth Jones’s Hobby came with a pan-European two-year guarantee for parts and components, and a five-year water-ingress guarantee. That’s all very well, but if something did go wrong before the guarantee expired, Jones would have to take the caravan back to Germany to be repaired unless he felt competent enough to take on the repair himself. And after the warranty expires, DIY could be your only option. “You’d have to import your own parts,” explains Michael Hold. “And you’d need to be an electrician, a plumber and a mechanic so you could mend it yourself because no dealer workshop will want to know.” That’s because UK workshop staff are only trained to repair UK-standard caravans, and there could be serious legal implications if you came back to them with a complaint regarding the caravan’s safety after they had worked on it.
The same applies to the servicing of your caravan. Most caravan owners have their tourers serviced once a year so that they can correct any water ingress or other faults before they worsen. But if your caravan hasn’t been built to UK standards, it’s unlikely any workshop will get involved. It’ll be up to you to watch for faults, and to repair them.

Foreign policy
It’s partly because of this difficulty in obtaining parts or getting repairs carried out that it might actually be impossible to get your caravan covered by a UK insurer. Specialist caravan insurer Tourer Select won’t cover caravans that aren’t to UK spec. According to the firm’s ’s Regional Director Graeme Hamilton: “If it was later brought up to UK standards then we would cover it in the same way as any other UK caravan. But we would first request documentation from the NCC-approved workshop who had updated it to confirm that it was indeed up to UK specification.” But with workshops unlikely to want to take on the responsibility of this work, it’s a Catch 22 predicament.
Insurers Caravan Guard are similarly wary. “For those caravanners who have a taste for European caravans, it is much better to buy from a UK distributor,” says the firm’s director, Chris Nettleton. “As a general rule, the Caravan Guard stance is to insure only those European caravans bought through a UK distributor.”
But both Tourer Select and Caravan Guard have an even more restrictive caveat than this. “There are certain foreign caravans which can cause insurers problems and carry an increased risk of theft,” says Nettleton. “Rather than accept these at normal terms, Caravan Guard have taken action to make sure we keep premiums at a competitive level for the rest of our customers.” For Caravan Guard that action means a blanket ban on all tourers by Hobby, Tabbert and LMC, even if they are bought in the UK and are UK-standard. Tourer Select doesn’t include theft in their cover for LMC tourers or any of the larger German models, though it will cover for damage and offer comprehensive insurance for smaller Hobbys and Tabberts.
What you will also need to bear in mind is that German consumer law won’t necessarily be the same as UK consumer law, so if for any reason you have a legal claim against your van’s manufacturer or dealer, you’ll either need to be up to speed with with German law or be prepared to take the hit. Lowdham Leisureworld’s Roger Crafts has another warning: “You could be dealing with a company that has no financial credibility whatsoever. We know someone who ordered a motorhome from Germany, and between ordering it at a show and the supposed delivery date, the German firm went bust.” The buyer will have at the least lost their deposit. You should also be on the look-out for dealers out to pull the wool over your eyes.
“A German dealer might promise he can get your choice of caravan to UK specification,” says Crafts, “but how will you know if he’s really done it?”
When choosing a foreign tourer, it’s also vital that you’re aware of what you are legally allowed to tow with a car back here in the UK. The law says that any caravan whose overall width is greater than 2.3m and whose overall body length (not including A-frame) is greater than 7m must be towed by a ‘goods vehicle’ weighing over 3500kg. In effect you will need a lorry to tow models such as the Hobby Prestige 610. If you fail to follow this rule, you could risk prosecution by the police.

The hard sell
Finally, you’ll need to think ahead to a time when you might want to sell your caravan. The easiest method for a UK model is usually to sell it to a dealer, either as a part-exchange or as a cash sale. But what about a van that’s not to UK spec? “You might find that a dealer doesn’t want to be involved with it all, even for a service, in case they get tarred with the brush of a ‘dodgy’ van,” says Lowdham Leisureworld’s Roger Crafts. This didn’t sound good, so we asked Surrey dealer Michael Jordan how he would feel about taking on a privately imported van. “We wouldn’t even look at anything with a door on the wrong side,” he said definitively. “The fact is, a van like that is going to be very hard to resell.” Just one of the reasons for this is that a professional trader has a legal duty to ensure that any second-hand caravan he sells is reasonably safe under all forseeable circumstances. Given that the Furniture and Furnishings Fire Safety Regulations of 1988, which specify how to make upholstery safe, have been in force for some 15 years, if a caravan’s upholstery did not comply, it would be difficult for a dealer to prove that it was nonetheless safe.
It is, however, not the legal duty of a private seller to ensure reasonable safety, and it is perfectly legal to sell a second-hand caravan without flame-retardant upholstery privately. However, this doesn’t ensure that the sale will be trouble-free. Michael Hold identifies another issue. “Just take a look at Autotrader magazine. There are loads of Hobbys, LMCs, and so on, advertised in there – and they’re all mobile numbers. Because of this, private buyers often assume they belong to travellers and don’t want to know.”
When you consider the number of cons against the pros of importing your own caravan, it’s hard not to agree with the NCC’s Alan Bishop: “Ultimately, I have ask if all the hassle and risk it worth it? Because of the upwards movement of the euro against the sterling, you are now unlikely to realise the financial benefits prevalent when exchange rates were approaching E1.60 to the pound. Stick with an NCC-approved model and you’ll have the peace of mind of an independent assessment.” The Swift Group’s marketing and sales director Richard White takes a similar stance. “I would challenge the price saving to be made,” he says. “There are loads of risks: the fabric, the electrics, and so on. I would advise against importing these products, largely because of safety and the potential legal responsibility at resale time.” Not surprisingly, Gareth Jones takes the other view. “As far as our Hobby is concerned, I think, on balance, it’s great value for money. There a couple of things that don’t work as well as we’d like, but they are minor irritations that you would only ever find out once you actually try living in your new caravan.”
There’s still no denying that savings of around £3000 are not to be sniffed at, even if they do come with so many caveats. So, if you really can’t ignore such a great deal, and you can be bothered to deal with reluctant workshops, sniffy insurers and wary private buyers, you might just find yourself a cracking bargain.