MOT fails happen - but here are some of the more unusual failures

Unless you’re replacing your lease car every three years, putting one through an MOT test eventually becomes part of being a driver. And as September sees a lot of new cars hit the UK’s roads, it’s a safe bet that many of you are about to do exactly that. Obviously, we hope your car sails through without any issues, but according to recent research from eBay, that is not always the case.

The UK’s largest online marketplace for vehicle parts and accessories, eBay’s research has revealed some very unusual, and in some cases, quite disturbing reasons for MOT failures.

Analysing Driver and Vehicle Standards Agency (DVSA) data, it looked at MOT failures between 1 June 2024 and 30 June 2025. And it turns out UK motorists are failing MOTs for reasons that range from careless to downright dangerous.

In fairness, a lot of MOT failures usually come as a surprise, often involving things we can’t see and may not necessarily notice for a while. You may not know you’ve got a split boot, or a leaking shock absorber, even a cracked suspension spring or worn brake pads may not have announced their presence yet. In those cases, there isn’t much you can do except fix the problem and hope it’s not too expensive.

Unfortunately, not every failure can be put down to simple wear and tear.

In the careless category, we have things like; tyres below the 1.6mm legal limit (the single most common cause of failure, affecting 1,081,318 vehicles), or having the wrong tyres completely; driving with two different headlight bulbs; and in 3,485 cases, missing wiper blades.

Why would you put your car in for an MOT without checking your tyres? More importantly, how have you not noticed you’re missing a wiper blade?

Abir Tewari, UK Director of Commercial Operations, Parts & Accessories at eBay, said: "Too many motorists are failing MOTs for avoidable reasons – from worn tyres to something as basic as a missing wiper blade. These are quick and inexpensive to fix...”

It’s hard to argue with that, but it doesn’t explain the downright dangerous.

Overall, suspension faults were the most common reason for MOT failures. We’ve already mentioned worn components and damaged seals, with damaged springs being the second most common cause of failure, accounting for more than 820,000 unsuccessful MOTs. Given the size of some of our potholes, that number probably won’t come as a surprise.

Missing suspension springs, suspension arms and more!

But your car shouldn’t even be on the road if those springs are missing entirely, as was the case in 394 vehicles. You definitely shouldn’t be driving around with missing suspension arms (20 people tried that one), or missing MacPherson struts (14 people didn’t notice that one either).

The suspension is responsible for keeping you on the road with your wheels pointing in the right direction, and every single one of those components is a key part of that suspension system. Cars in this condition shouldn’t be anywhere near other road users.

It’s absolutely vital that you keep your car in the best possible condition, not only to ensure the safety of you and everyone you share the roads with, but to save you the cost and hassle of dealing with MOT issues that could easily have been avoided with a little more care and attention.

Even if you lease your car, if the term is more than three years then you’ll be putting it in for an MOT at some point. In fact, if you are leasing, or planning on doing so in the future, you might want to consider making your life even easier by opting for a maintained lease agreement.

Opting for a maintained lease not only makes life easier when it comes to servicing, it could also take the cost and hassle out of repairing many of these faults long before they have the chance to turn into an MOT failure.