A van does not pay the car rate. It is a goods vehicle, and every 2-axle goods vehicle is Class C at the Dartford Crossing, whatever it weighs. The only line that moves your van is the axle count.
How much is the Dart Charge for a van?
A van pays £4.20 per crossing (£3.60 on a pre-pay account). That is Class C, and it applies to every van at any weight, because gov.uk classes a van as a goods vehicle and charges 2-axle goods vehicles £4.20. It is 70p more than the £3.50 car rate. The charge applies 6am to 10pm; crossings between 10pm and 6am are free.
It is widely repeated that a van under 3.5 tonnes pays the car rate. No weight band decides what you pay at Dartford. The Dartford-Thurrock Crossing Charging Scheme Order 2013 builds its goods classes from the axle-based categories in the 2001 vehicle-class regulations, and deliberately not from the 3.5-tonne, 12-tonne mass categories the same regulations define alongside them. gov.uk reflects that: its Class C row reads simply "Vehicles with 2 axles", under a heading that names vans.
Masses do appear in the scheme, so it is worth being exact about where. The 2013 order's class definitions exclude quadricycles, and the 2001 regulations define a quadricycle as a four-wheeler with "an unladen mass of, in the case of vehicles intended for carrying goods, not more than 550 kg and, in other cases, not more than 400kg" AND "an engine with a maximum net engine power not exceeding 15kW". Both limbs are required, so the mass figures are not weight tests standing on their own. They decide whether a vehicle counts as being in the category at all, and no van is near either limb. What the scheme has no version of is a weight band that moves you from one charge to another.
Two-axle goods vehicles, at any weight. This is where a van lands whether it is a car-derived van or a 7-tonne box.
PAYG
£4.20
Pre-pay
£3.60
Includes:
Adding a third axle doubles the charge. Weight still does not come into it.
PAYG
£8.40
Pre-pay
£7.20
Includes:
Two things decide it, and neither is the weight. First, does the vehicle carry goods? Second, how many axles has it got?
Our arithmetic over the gov.uk Class C rates across 52 weeks, counting each direction as its own crossing. The last column is what the 3.5-tonne myth would have cost you to believe: the gap between the Class C rate a van actually pays and the £3.50 car rate it is often said to pay.
| Crossings a week | Class C PAYG | Class C pre-pay | Pre-pay saves | Over the car rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1x£36/yr over the car rate | £218 | £187 | £31/yr | |
| 2x£73/yr over the car rate | £437 | £374 | £62/yr | |
| 3x£109/yr over the car rate | £655 | £562 | £94/yr | |
| 5x£182/yr over the car rate | £1092 | £936 | £156/yr | |
| 10x£364/yr over the car rate | £2184 | £1872 | £312/yr |
One pre-pay account can carry several vehicles, all charged at the discounted rate from the same balance and the same Direct Debit. The postal application form has space for 4; online there is no published limit. The fleet guide covers the admin side.
A van pays £4.20 per crossing, or £3.60 on a pre-pay account. Vans are goods vehicles, and gov.uk puts every 2-axle goods vehicle in Class C regardless of what it weighs, so a small Berlingo and a 7-tonne box van pay the same. The charge applies 6am to 10pm; crossings between 10pm and 6am are free.
Yes. A car is Class B at £3.50 (£2.80 pre-pay) and a van is Class C at £4.20 (£3.60 pre-pay), so a van costs 70p more per crossing pay-as-you-go and 80p more on pre-pay. The gap is not about size or weight: gov.uk lists vans under 'Buses, coaches, vans and other goods vehicles', which is a different table from cars.
A Ford Transit pays £4.20 per crossing, or £3.60 on a pre-pay account. It is a 2-axle goods vehicle, which is Class C. Weight makes no difference: the short-wheelbase 3.1-tonne Transit and the 4.7-tonne jumbo are both Class C, and neither pays the £3.50 car rate.
No. No weight band decides what you pay at Dartford. The Dartford-Thurrock Crossing Charging Scheme Order 2013 sets the goods classes by axle count, taking the axle-based categories from the 2001 vehicle-class regulations rather than the 3.5-tonne and 12-tonne mass categories those same regulations define. Two axles is Class C at £4.20; more than two is Class D at £8.40. The only masses in the scheme sit inside the quadricycle definition that the goods classes exclude, and they come paired with a power test: a four-wheeler falls outside the goods class only if its unladen mass is no more than 550kg AND its net engine power does not exceed 15kW. No van is near either limb.
No. A 2-axle van towing a trailer stays Class C at £4.20, or £3.60 on a pre-pay account. gov.uk's charge table says to count droppable axles whether they are up or down but to 'only count trailer axles for articulated vehicles'. The 2001 vehicle-class regulations define Class NAB(1)(a) as a motor vehicle with two axles and Class NAB(1)(b) as that same vehicle drawing a trailer, and article 4(4) of the 2013 charging order puts both in the same charge item. For cars, gov.uk is even more direct: Class B reads 'Cars (including trailers)'.
Yes. A pre-pay account cuts a Class C van from £4.20 to £3.60 per crossing, a saving of 60p, and a Class D vehicle from £8.40 to £7.20. One account can hold more than one vehicle: the Dart Charge terms say you can register multiple vehicles to one account, and all of them get the discounted rate from the same balance and Direct Debit. No official document publishes a maximum number.
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