How to buy a car at a Mathewsons auction

Each Pickering sale is three days, Wednesday to Friday from 10am, with up to 900 lots: lots 1 to 300 on the Wednesday, 301 to 600 on the Thursday and 601 to 900 on the Friday. The sale days themselves are closed to the public and the trade. You bid online, by telephone or by commission, and you watch the hammer fall on the live feed, not from a chair in the room. The part you can attend is the viewing: six days before the sale, Wednesday to the following Tuesday, Monday to Friday 9 to 5 and Saturday 9 to 12, closed Sunday, at the Pickering saleroom on Enterprise Way, £5 at the door with a charity donation included. No one aged 16 or under, no pets, no food or drink, no handbags or large bags. If you cannot make the viewing week, Mathewsons will book a private viewing of a specific lot by arrangement.

Create an account on the Mathewsons site and verify your identity; photographic ID is required. Each account is given a trust level with a bid limit, which Mathewsons confirm by email after you pre-register, so do it days before the sale, not on the morning. When you add a debit card the system takes a 1p security check. The card must be in your own name and registered to the address on your account.

Online, through your account, while the sale is live. Telephone, by arranging it with the office beforehand, and someone rings you as your lot approaches. Commission, which means you leave your maximum with Mathewsons before the sale goes live, through your account or the office, and the auctioneer bids for you up to that figure. A commission bid is the discipline most first-timers need: you decide the ceiling at home, in daylight, with the fees added, and nobody can talk you past it. Mathewsons' terms say they will execute commission bids if instructed but accept no responsibility for an error in doing so, which is standard.

The hammer price is not what you pay. Mathewsons charge a buyer's commission on every vehicle, and VAT is added to the commission. The published bands are 10 per cent plus VAT on a hammer price up to £2,000; 7.5 per cent plus VAT from £2,001 to £20,000; and above £20,000, 7.5 per cent plus VAT on the first £20,000 and 5 per cent plus VAT on the rest. Bidding online adds a further 1 per cent. Memorabilia and bicycles are 15 per cent plus VAT with a £5 minimum, and registration numbers 10 per cent plus VAT.

A 20 per cent deposit is taken on sale day and the balance is due within 48 hours of the auction closing. Payment is by debit card; Mathewsons' terms say credit cards and cheques are not accepted, and late payment attracts interest. Collection: the How to Buy page asks for collection within 14 days and the formal terms say 10 days, after which storage is £10 plus VAT per lot per day, so treat 10 days as the limit and ring the saleroom before you set off. Mathewsons offer collection and delivery at what they describe as a reduced rate; ask for a quote when you pay. Our getting-it-home page covers the MOT, tax and insurance questions for the drive.

Every vehicle is sold as seen, "with all faults, imperfections and errors of description", and the catalogue photograph is for illustration only. Consumer law gives an auction buyer far less protection than a buyer from a dealer, and most lots are entered by private individuals, against whom consumer rights do not arise at all, so treat the sale as final. That is not a warning against Mathewsons; it is how every car auction in Britain works, and it is why the viewing week matters more than anything else on this page. Our viewing week checklist and the general guide to buying a classic car set out what to look at when you cannot drive the car.

A lot that fails to reach its reserve is unsold. Mathewsons run timed online sales of unsold lots after the main auction, and they may ring a seller during the sale if the highest bid is close to the reserve. If you wanted a lot that did not sell, ring the office; the seller may take an offer, and the commission still applies.