A lamp that has been on since the spring is not a mystery to anybody but you. It is a stored fault code sitting in a module, waiting for somebody with a reader. Whether it costs you the APK, the Dutch roadworthiness test, depends on which system switched it on and on when the car was first registered. Both of those are findable before you book anything.
How long it has been on changes nothing. Four months of looking past an amber symbol does not make the fault behind it smaller, and it does not make it invisible to a tester. Our guide to what the APK actually tests is worth reading first, because owners tend to assume the inspection is about lamps when most of it is about measurements.
The inspection has three headings, and lamps are in none of them
The RDW divides the APK into road safety, the environment and the register. Its own summary of the test puts brakes, wheel suspension, shock absorbers, tyres, steering, lighting and bodywork under safety. Under environment it puts exhaust emissions and parts such as the particulate filter and the catalytic converter. Under the register it puts the odometer reading, the vehicle identification number and the fuel the car actually runs on.
Your dashboard does not appear in that list. The lamp itself is not an inspection point. What a tester does with a handful of systems is something narrower: check whether the car’s own warning device is reporting a defect. And there the rule turns on a date.
The line runs through the end of 2017
For a car first used after 31 December 2017, a warning device that reports a fault in certain safety systems is a rejection point. The RDW’s APK handbook states it plainly for airbags: the warning device of the airbag system of passenger cars first used after that date may not indicate a defect. The handbook page on protecting occupants gives the inspection method as a visual and auditory check, and says that where a warning signal appears after the engine is started to show the system is not working properly, the requirement is taken as not met. The handbook page on brake system components carries the same construction for the anti-lock braking system on cars first used after 31 December 2017.
For a car first used before 1 January 2018 the same lamps land somewhere much softer. They produce a repair advice point, which is not a rejection. The handbook’s list of repair advice points runs through them with codes: the warning device for the airbag, belt tensioning or belt force limitation system, for the stability control system, for the tyre pressure monitoring system, for electronic power steering, for the anti-lock braking system, and for the electronic braking system. Each one is an advice to repair, recorded on the report, with the car still passing.
Separately there are advice points, which the handbook defines as items that are not rejection points but that can be expected to stop meeting the APK requirements before long. A tester may well put your lamp there.
So the honest answer to whether a warning light fails an APK is that it depends on the system and on the year of the car, and that an older car very often passes with the lamp still glowing.
The engine light works differently, because emissions get measured
Nothing on the emissions side relies on a lamp telling the truth. The handbook section on noise and the environment sets out carbon monoxide at idle for petrol engines, the functioning of the catalytic converter, the soot measurement for diesel engines, the presence and the operation of the particulate filter, and a procedure for reading the emission related on-board diagnostic system.
That cuts both ways for a seller. A fault that is affecting what comes out of the exhaust will show up in the measurement whether the lamp is lit or not. A lamp that is on because the car has stored an emissions code is a reasonable warning that the measurement will go against you.
What you must not do is decide for yourself what the symbol means. Makes use similar outlines for different systems, and the symbols sit close together on a dark dashboard. Your own owner’s handbook is the authority there. Nothing on the internet, this page included, can tell you what the fourth lamp from the left means on your particular car.
Describing a fault nobody has diagnosed
Say what you know and stop there. When the lamp came on. Whether it has ever gone off. Whether anything changed in how the car drives, starts or stops. Whether a garage has read the codes, and if so what they said. That is a complete description, and all of it is true.
What gets sellers into trouble is the translation. “It is only a sensor” is a diagnosis, and if you have not had the car read you are inventing it. A buyer who is told that the ABS lamp has been on since February and that nobody has looked at it will take the car as it is. A buyer who is told it is nothing and then finds a failed pump has been misled, and is entitled to say so.
The history is not yours to curate either. When you sell, the RDW asks you to give the buyer the report of the last inspection, and repair points and advice points from that inspection are printed on it. An owner can also pull the free RDW vehicle report with DigiD, which includes the APK history with its repair and advice points. Assume the advice point from two years ago is readable.
Read it, or sell it as it stands
Having the codes read is information. It turns “a lamp is on” into “this code is stored”, which is a better sentence for a buyer and a better sentence for you. It commits you to nothing.
Repairing the fault to lift the price is a different decision, and our answer to that one is usually no. Work bought to make a sale look tidier tends to cost more than it adds, and you would be spending it on a car you have already decided to be rid of. We do not ask you to repair anything or to clean anything before we collect.
The one case where the sums change is a car first used after 2017 whose APK is almost due, with a lamp reporting one of the systems that is a rejection point. There you are choosing between the repair and selling the car with the inspection unrenewed, and both are real options. A car can be sold with an expired APK, and it never has to move under its own power to reach us.
If you would rather hand it over as it is, ask us for an offer and write in the request which lamp is on and since when. A number plate (kenteken) and the mileage are enough to start. How soon the figure comes back depends on how much detail came with the request, so the sentence about the lamp is doing real work.
Frequently asked questions
Will my car fail the APK because a warning light is on?
It depends on the system and on when the car was first used. For cars first used after 31 December 2017 the handbook makes a warning device reporting a fault in the airbag system or the anti-lock braking system a rejection point. On older cars the same warning devices are recorded as repair advice points and the car still passes.
Can I sell a car with a warning light on?
Yes. A transfer runs on the registration card (kentekencard) and the registration code (tenaamstellingscode), and no inspection or diagnosis is part of that. Tell the buyer what is lit and for how long.
Should I have the codes read before I ask for an offer?
If you can, yes. Do it for the description. The repair is a separate decision and we are not asking you to make it. A stored code is a fact, a lit lamp is a symptom, and we will quote on either.
Does the lamp show up anywhere the buyer can check?
Not the lamp itself. What is visible is the inspection record: the last APK report, which the RDW asks you to hand over, and the APK history with repair and advice points in the RDW vehicle report.
What if I do not know what the symbol means?
Use the owner’s handbook for your own car and do not guess from a general list. If the handbook is gone, a garage can read the codes and tell you which system is complaining.