i had a black Q plate 3door cossie about 3 years ago.

the woman who owned it from new had it stolen recovered and had a few bits missing when it was found again, after a while of it being sorted out the dvla chose to put it on a Q plate, but the woman then kept it for about another 14 years.

luckily we knew this woman and a mate then bought it off her as the Q plate didnt bother him as we knew the car, he then had it about 6 months and i snapped it up off him for a bargain price of 3k and the car had only covered 43,000 miles so in my eyes i could hardly go wrong with it!